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ONTOLOGY 

OR    THE 

THEORY  OF  BEING 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

THE  SCIENCE  OF  LOGIC 

AN  INQUIRY  INTO 

THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  ACCURATE  THOUGHT 
AND  SCIENTIFIC  METHOD 

2  vols.     8vo. 
Vol.  I.      CONCEPTION,    JUDGMENT,  AND    INFERENCE. 

73.  6d.  net. 

Vol.  II.     METHOD,  SCIENCE,  AND  CERTITUDE. 
js.  6d.  net. 


SCHOLASTICISM  OLD  AND  NEW.  An  Intro- 
duction to  Scholastic  Philosophy,  Medieval  and 
Modern.  By  M.  DE  WULF,  Doctor  of  Laws,  Doctor 
of  Philosophy  and  Letters,  Professor  at  the  University 
of  Louvain.  Translated  by  P.  COFFEV,  Ph.D. 
8vo,  6s.  net. 

HISTORY  OF  MEDIEVAL  PHILOSOPHY.  By 
M.  DE  WULF,  Doctor  of  Laws,  Doctor  of  Philosophy 
and  Letters,  Professor  at  the  University  of  Louvain. 
Translated  by  P.  COFFEY,  Ph.D.  8vo,  los.  6d.  net. 


LONGMANS,  GREEN  AND  CO., 

LONDON,  NEW  YORK,    BOMBAY,    CALCUTTA,   AND   MADRAS 


ONTOLOGY 


OR    THE 


THEORY  OF  BEING 


AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  GENERAL  METAPHYSICS 


BY 

P.  COFFEY,  PH.D.   (LOUVAIN) 

PROFESSOR    OF    LOGIC   AND    METAPHYSICS,    MAYNOOTH    COLLEGE,    IRELAND 


LONGMANS,     GREEN     AND     CO. 

39     PATERNOSTER     ROW,     LONDON 

FOURTH  AVENUE  &  30TH  STREET,  NEW  YORK 

BOMBAY,    CALCUTTA   AND    MADRAS 

1914 


C 


TO 

THE  STUDENTS 
PAST  AND  PRESENT 

OF 

MAYNOOTH  COLLEGE 


PREFACE 

* 

IT  is  hoped  that  the  present  volume  will  supply  a  want 
that  is  really  felt  by  students  of  philosophy  in  our  univer- 
sities— the  want  of  an  English  text-book  on  General 
Metaphysics  from  the  Scholastic  standpoint.  It  is  the 
author's  intention  to  supplement  his  Science  of  Logic,1  and 
the  present  treatise  on  Ontology,  by  a  volume  on  the 
Theory  of  Knowledge.  Hence  no  disquisitions  on  the 
latter  subject  will  be  found  in  these  pages  :  the  Moderate 
Realism  of  Aristotle  and  the  Schoolmen  is  assumed 
throughout. 

In  the  domain  of  Ontology  there  are  many  scholastic 
theories  and  discussions  which  are  commonly  regarded 
by  non-scholastic  writers  as  possessing  nowadays  for  the 
student  of  philosophy  an  interest  that  is  merely  historical. 
This  mistaken  notion  is  probably  due  to  the  fact  that  few 
if  any  serious  attempts  have  yet  been  made  to  transpose 
these  questions  from  their  medieval  setting  into  the 
language  and  context  of  contemporary  philosophy.  Per- 
haps not  a  single  one  of  these  problems  is  really  and  in  sub- 
stance alien  to  present-day  speculations.  The  author  has 
endeavoured,  by  his  treatment  of  such  characteristically 
"  medieval  "  discussions  as  those  on  Potentia  and  Actus, 
Essence  and  Existence,  Individuation,  the  Theory  of 
Distinctions,  Substance  and  Accident,  Nature  and  Person, 
Logical  and  Real  Relations,  Efficient  and  Final  Causes, 
to  show  that  the  issues  involved  are  in  every  instance  as 
fully  and  keenly  debated — in  an  altered  setting  and  a  new 
terminology — by  recent  and  living  philosophers  of  every 

1  2  vols.     Longmans,  1912. 


viii  PREFACE 

school  of  thought  as  they  were  by  St.  Thomas  and  his 
contemporaries  in  the  golden  age  of  medieval  schol- 
asticism. And,  as  the  purposes  of  a  text-book  demanded, 
attention  has  been  devoted  to  stating  the  problems  clearly, 
to  showing  the  significance  and  bearings  of  discussions 
and  solutions,  rather  than  to  detailed  analyses  of  argu- 
ments. At  the  same  time  it  is  hoped  that  the  treatment 
is  sufficiently  full  to  be  helpful  even  to  advanced  students 
and  to  all  who  are  interested  in  the  "  Metaphysics  of  the 
Schools".  For  the  convenience  of  the  reader  the  more 
advanced  portions  are  printed  in  smaller  type. 

The  teaching  of  St.  Thomas  and  the  other  great 
Schoolmen  of  the  Middle  Ages  forms  the  groundwork 
of  the  book.  This  corpus  of  doctrine  is  scarcely  yet 
accessible  outside  its  Latin  sources.  As  typical  of  the 
fuller  scholastic  text-books  the  excellent  treatise  of  the 
Spanish  author,  Urraburu,1  has  been  most  frequently 
•consulted.  Much  assistance  has  also  been  derived  from 
Kleutgen's  Philosophic  der  Vorzeit?  a  monumental  work 
-which  ought  to  have  been  long  since  translated  into 
iEnglish.  And  finally,  the  excellent  treatise  in  the 
Louvain  Cours  de  Philosophic,  by  the  present  Cardinal 
Archbishop  of  Mechlin,3  has  been  consulted  with  profit 
and  largely  followed  in  many  places.  The  writer  freely 
and  gratefully  acknowledges  his  indebtedness  to  these  and 
other  authors  quoted  and  referred  to  in  the  course  of  the 
present  volume. 

1  Institutiones  Metaphysicce,  quas  Romce,  in  Pontificia  Universitate  Gregoriana 
tradiderat  P.  JOANNES  JOSEPHUS  URRABURU,  S.J.     Volumen  Secundum:  Ontologia 
•(Rome,  1891). 

2  French  version  by  SIERP,  4  vols.     Paris,  Gaume,  1868. 

*Ontologie,  ou  Metaphysique  Generate,  par  D.  MERCIER.  Louvain,  3me  edit., 
1902. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 

GENERAL  INTRODUCTION. 

PAGE 

I.  Reason  of  Introductory  Chapter i 

II.  Philosophy:  the  Name  and  the  Thing I 

III.  Divisions  of  Philosophy.     Speculative  and  Practical  Philosophy     .         .  7 

IV.  Departments  of  Practical  Philosophy :  Logic,  Ethics  and  Esthetics        .  10 
V.  Departments  of  Speculative  Philosophy  ;  Metaphysics    ....  14 

VI.  Departments  of  Metaphysics:    Cosmology,    Psychology  and   Natural 

Theology 18 

VII.  Departments  of  Metaphysics  :  Ontology  and  Epistemology     ...  20 

VIII.  Remarks  on  some  Misgivings  and  Prejudices   .......  23 

CHAPTER  I. 
BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS. 

1.  Our  Concept  of  Being:  its  Expression  and  Features 32 

2.  In  what  Sense  are  All  Things  that  Exist  or  can  Exist  said  to  be  "  Real," 

or  to  have  "  Being  "  ? 36 

3.  Real  Being  and  Logical  Being 42 

4.  Real  Being  and  Ideal  Being 45 

5.  Fundamental  Distinctions  in  Real  Being    . 46 

CHAPTER  II. 

BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS. 

6.  The  Static  and  the  Changing 51 

7.  The  Potential  and  the  Actual:    (a)    Possibility,  Absolute,  Relative,  and 

Adequate 52 

8.  (b)  Subjective  "  Potentia,"  Active  and  Passive 54 

9.  (c)  Actuality :  its  Relation  to  Potentiality 56 

10.  Analysis  of  Change 61 

11.  Kinds  of  Change 68 

CHAPTER  III. 

EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE. 

12.  Existence .        .  74 

13.  Essence 75 

14.  Characteristics  of  Abstract  Essences 79 

15.  Grounds  of  those  Characteristics 82 

16.  Possible  Essences  as  such  are  Something  Distinct  from  mere  Logical  Being, 

and  from  Nothingness 84 

ix 


x  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

17.  Possible  Essences  have,  besides  Ideal   Being,  no  other  sort  of  Being  or 

Reality  Proper  and  Intrinsic  to  Themselves 86 

18.  Inferences  from  our  Knowledge  of  Possible  Essences  .....  89 

19.  Critical  Analysis  of  those  Inferences 91 

20.  Essences  are  Intrinsically  Possible,  not  because  God  can  make  them  Exist 

actually;  nor  yet  because  He  freely  wills  them  to  be  Possible;   nor 
because  He   understands   them   as   Possible;    but   because  they  are 

Modes  in  which  the  Divine  Essence  is  linkable  ad  Extra     ...  95 

21.  Distinction  between    Essence    and    Existence    in    actually   existing    Con- 

tingent or  Created  Beings 101 

22.  State  of  the  Question t  103 

23.  The  Theory  of  Distinctions  in  its  Application  to  the  Question     .         .         .104 

24.  Solutions  of  the  Question 107 

CHAPTER  IV. 
REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD. 

25.  The  Transcendental  Attributes  or  Properties  of  Being :  Unity,  Truth  and 

Goodness 114 

26.  Transcendental  Unity          .         . 115 

27.  Kinds  of  Unity 116 

28.  Multitude  and  Number 118 

29.  The  Individual  and  the  Universal 120 

30.  The  "  Metaphysical  Grades  of  Being  "  in  the  Individual      ....  122 

31.  Individuality 123 

32.  The  "  Principle  of  Individuation  " 125 

33.  Individuation  of  Accidents 133 

34.  Identity 135 

35.  Distinction 139 

36.  Logical  Distinctions  and  their  Grounds 140 

37.  The  Virtual  Distinction  and  the  Real  Distinction 142 

38.  The  Real  Distinction  and  its  Tests  • 148 

39.  Some  Questionable  Distinctions.     The  Scotist  Distinction  ....  153 

CHAPTER  V. 
REALITY  AND  THE  TRUE. 

40.  Ontological  Truth  Considered  from  Analysis  of  Experience         .         .         .  158 

41.  Ontological  Truth  Considered  Synthetically,  from  the  Standpoint  of  its 

Ultimate  Real  Basis 160 

42.  Ontological  Truth  a  Transcendental  Attribute  of  Reality      ....  163 

43.  Attribution  of  Falsity  to  Real  Being 164 

CHAPTER  VI. 
REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD. 

44.  The  Good  as  "  Desirable"  and  as  "  Suitable" 167 

45.  The  Good  as  an  "  End,"  "  Perfecting"  the  "  Nature  "  168 

46.  The  Perfect.     Analysis  of  the  Notion  of  "  Perfection  "         ....  171 

47.  Grades  of  Perfection.     Reality  as  Standard  of  Value 172 

48.  The  Good,  the  Real,  and  the  Actual 173 

49.  Kinds  of  Goodness ;  Divisions  of  the  Good 174 

50.  Goodness  a  Transcendental  Attribute  of  Being 177 

51.  Optimism  and  Pessimism 181 

52.  Evil :  its  Nature  and  Causes.     Manicheism 182 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS  xi 

CHAPTER  VII. 
REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL. 

PAGE 

53.  The  Concept  of  the  Beautiful  from  the  Standpoint  of  Experience        .         .  192 

54.  The  Esthetic  Sentiment.     Apprehension  of  the  Beautiful    ....  195 

55.  Objective  Factors  in  the  Constitution  of  the  Beautiful        ....  198 

56.  Some  Definitions  of  the  Beautiful 201 

57.  Classifications.     The  Beautiful  in  Nature 202 

58.  The  Beautiful  in  Art.     Scope  and  Function  of  the  Fine  Arts      .         .         .  203 

CHAPTER  VIII. 
THE  CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.      SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT. 

59.  The  Conception  of  Ultimate  Categories 207 

60.  The  Aristotelian  Categories 209 

61.  The  Phenomenist  Attack  on  the  Traditional  Doctrine  of  Substance   .         .  213 

62.  The  Scholastic  View  of  our  Knowledge  in  regard  to  the  Existence  and 

Nature  of  Substances 216 

63.  Phenomenist  Difficulties  against  this  View.     Its  Vindication      .         .         .  219 

64.  Erroneous  Views  on  the  Nature  of  Substance 225 

65.  The  Nature  of  Accident.     Its  Relation  to  Substance.     Its  Causes       .         .  232 

66.  Main  Divisions  of  Accidents 236 

67.  Real    Existence    of    Accidents.       Nature    of    the    Distinction    between 

Accidents  and  Substance 240 

68.  Modal  Accidents  and  the  Modal  Distinction 245 

69.  Distinction   between   Substance  and  its  "  Proper "  Accidents.     Unity  of 

the  Concrete  Being 246 

CHAPTER  IX. 
NATURE  AND  PERSON. 

70.  Some  Divisions  of  Substances 252 

71.  Substance  and  Nature 257 

72.  Subsistence  and  Personality 261 

73.  Distinction  between  the   Individual   Nature  and  its  Subsistence.      What 

Constitutes  Personality  ? 266 

74.  Consciousness  of  the  Personal  Self 273 

75.  False  Theories  of  Personality 276 

CHAPTER  X. 
SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING  :    QUALITY. 

76.  Ontology  and  the  Accident-Modes  of  Being 285 

77.  Nature  of  the  Accident  called  Quality 286 

78.  Immediate  Sub-Classes  of  Quality  as  Genus  Suprenium       ....  288 

79.  Habits  and  Dispositions 292 

80.  Powers,  Faculties  and  Forces 298 

81.  Some  Characteristics  of  Qualities 305 

CHAPTER  XI. 
QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME. 

82.  Analysis  of  the  Concept  of  Quantity 309 

83.  Corporeal  Substance,  Quantity  and  Extension 311 

84.  Place  and  Space 318 

85.  Time  :  its  Apprehension  and  Measurement 322 

86.  Duration  of  Immutable  Being :  Eternity 328 


xii  TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XII. 
RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE. 

PAGE 

87.  Importance  of  the  Present  Category 332 

88.  Analysis  of  the  Concept  of  Relation 336 

89.  Logical  Relations 338 

90.  Real  Relations;  Their  Existence  Vindicated 341 

91.  Mutual  and  Mixed  Relations  ;  Transcendental  Relations     ....  343 

92.  Predicamental  Relations ;  Their  Foundations  and  Divisions       .         .         .  345 

93.  In  what  does  the  Reality  of  Predicamental  Relations  Consist  ?   .         .         .  349 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

CAUSALITY  ;   CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES. 

94.  Traditional  Concept  of  Cause 357 

95.  Aristotle's  Fourfold  Division 361 

96.  Material  and  Formal  Causes 364 

97.  Efficient  Cause;  Traditional  Concept  Explained 366 

98.  Some  Scholia  on  Causation.     The  Principle  of  Causality  ....  369 

99.  Classification  of  Efficient  Causes 372 

CHAPTER  XIV. 
EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY;  PHENOMENISM  AND  OCCASIONALISM. 

100.  Objective  Validity  of  the  Traditional  Concept  of  Efficient  Causality          .     381 

101.  Origin  of  the  Concept  of  Efficient  Cause 385 

102.  Analysis  of  Efficient  Causality,  or  Actio  and  Passio  :  (a)  The  First  Cause 

and  Created  Causes 388 

103.  (b)  Actio  Immanens  and  Actio  T/ansiens  ......  391 

104.  Erroneous  Theories  of  Efficient  Causality  ;  Imagination  and  Thought       .  392 

105.  The  Subject  of  Efficient  Causality.     Occasionalism 396 

CHAPTER  XV. 
FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER. 

106.  Two  Conceptions  of  Experience,  the  Mechanical  and  the  Teleological       .     404 

107.  The   Concept  of  Final   Cause;    Its   Objective  Validity  in  all    Nature. 

Classification  of  Final  Causes 406 

108.  Causality  of  the  Final  Cause ;  Relation  of  the  Latter  to  Efficient,  Formal 

and  Material  Causes 411 

109.  Nature  and   the   Laws   of  Nature.      Character  and  Grounds  of  their 

Necessity  and  Universality.     Scientific  Determinism  and  Philosophic 

Fatalism 416 

no.  The  Order  of  the  Universe;  A  Fact  and  its  Implications.         .         .         .     428 

INDEX 435 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION. 

I.  REASON  OF  INTRODUCTORY  CHAPTER.— It  is  desirable  that 
at  some  stage  in  the  course  of  his  investigations  the  student  of 
philosophy  should  be  invited  to  take  a  brief  general  survey  of 
the  work  in  which  he  is  engaged.     This  purpose  will  be  served 
by  a  chapter  on  the  general  aim  and  scope  of  philosophy ',  its  dis- 
tinctive characteristics  as  compared  with  other  lines  of  human 
thought,  and  its  relations  to  these  latter.     Such  considerations 
will  at  the  same  time  help  to  define  Ontology,  thus  introducing 
the  reader  to  the  subject-matter  of  the  present  volume. 

II.  PHILOSOPHY  :  THE  NAME  AND  THE  THING.— In  the  fifth 
book  of  Cicero's  Tusculan  Disputations  we  read  that  the  terms 
philosophus  and  philosophia  were  first  employed  by  Pythagoras 
who  flourished  in  the  sixth  century  before  Christ,  that  this  ancient 
sage  was  modest  enough  to  call  himself  not  a  "  wise  man  "  but  a 
"  lover  of  wisdom  "  (<£tXo9,  a-ofaa),  and  his  calling  not  a  profession 
of  wisdom  but  a   search   for  wisdom.       However,  despite  the 
disclaimer,   the    term  philosophy   soon  came  to  signify  wisdom 
simply,  meaning  by  this  the  highest  and  most  precious  kind  of 
knowledge. 

Now  human  knowledge  has  for  its  object  everything  that 
falls  in  any  way  within  human  experience.  It  has  extensively  a 
great  variety  in  its  subject-matter,  and  intensively  a  great  variety 
in  its  degrees  of  depth  and  clearness  and  perfection.  Individual 
facts  of  the  past,  communicated  by  human  testimony,  form  the 
raw  materials  of  historical  knowledge.  Then  there  are  all  the 
individual  things  and  events  that  fall  within  one's  own  personal 
experience.  Moreover,  by  the  study  of  human  language  (or 
languages),  of  works  of  the  human  mind  and  products  of  human 
genius  and  skill,  we  gain  a  knowledge  of  literature,  and  of  the 
arts — the  fine  arts  and  the  mechanical  arts.  But  not  merely  do 
we  use  our  senses  and  memory  thus  to  accumulate  an  unassorted 
stock  of  informations  about  isolated  facts  :  a  miscellaneous  mass 
of  mental  furniture  which  constitutes  the  bulk  of  human  know- 


2  .1      ONTOLOGY 

ledge  in  its  least  developed  form — cognitio  "  vulgaris?  the  knowledge 
of  the  comparatively  uneducated  and  unreflecting  classes  of  man- 
kind. We  also  use  our  reasoning  faculty  to  reflect,  compare, 
classify  these  informations,  to  interpret  them,  to  reason  about 
them,  to  infer  from  them  general  truths  that  embrace  individual 
things  and  events  beyond  our  personal  experience ;  we  try  to 
explain  them  by  seeking  out  their  reasons  and  causes.  This 
mental  activity  gradually  converts  our  knowledge  into  scientific 
knowledge,  and  thus  gives  rise  to  those  great  groups  of  system- 
atized truths  called  the  sciences :  as,  for  example,  the  physical 
and  mathematical  sciences,  the  elements  of  which  usually  form 
part  of  our  early  education.  These  sciences  teach  us  a  great 
deal  about  ourselves  and  the  universe  in  which  we  live.  There  is 
no  need  to  dwell  on  the  precious  services  conferred  upon  man- 
kind by  discoveries  due  to  the  progress  of  the  various  special 
sciences  :  mathematics  as  applied  to  engineering  of  all  sorts  ; 
astronomy  ;  the  physical  sciences  of  light,  heat,  sound,  electricity, 
magnetism,  etc. ;  chemistry  in  all  its  branches  ;  physiology  and 
anatomy  as  applied  in  medicine  and  surgery.  All  these  un- 
doubtedly contribute  much  to  man's  bodily  well-being.  But 
man  has  a  mind  as  well  as  a  body,  and  he  is  moreover  a  social 
being  :  there  are,  therefore,  other  special  sciences — "  human  "  as 
distinct  from  "  physical "  sciences — in  which  man  himself  is 
studied  in  his  mental  activities  and  social  relations  with  his 
fellow-men  :  the  sciences  of  social  and  political  economy,  con- 
stitutional and  civil  law,  government,  statesmanship,  etc.  Further- 
more, man  is  a  moral  being,  recognizing  distinctions  of  good  and 
bad,  right  and  wrong,  pleasure  and  happiness,  duty  and  responsi- 
bility, in  his  own  conduct ;  and  finally  he  is  a  religious  being, 
face  to  face  with  the  fact  that  men  universally  entertain  views, 
beliefs,  convictions  of  some  sort  or  other,  regarding  man's  sub- 
jection to,  and  dependence  on,  some  higher  power  or  powers 
dwelling  somehow  or  somewhere  within  or  above  the  whole 
universe  of  his  direct  and  immediate  experience  :  there  are  there- 
fore also  sciences  which  deal  with  these  domains,  morality  and 
religion.  Here,  however,  the  domains  are  so  extensive,  and  the 
problems  raised  by  their  phenomena  are  of  such  far-reaching 
importance,  that  the  sciences  which  deal  with  them  can  hardly  be 
called  special  sciences,  but  rather  constituent  portions  of  the  one 
wider  and  deeper  general  science  which  is  what  men  commonly 
understand  nowadays  by  philosophy. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  3 

The  distinction  between  the  special  sciences  on  the  one  hand 
and  philosophy,  the  general  science,  on  the  other,  will  help  us  to 
realize  more  clearly  the  nature  and  scope  of  the  latter.  The 
special  sciences  are  concerned  with  discovering  the  proximate 
reasons  and  causes  of  this,  that,  and  the  other  definite  department 
in  the  whole  universe  of  our  experience.  The  subject-matter  of 
some  of  them  is  totally  different  from  that  of  others  :  physiology 
studies  the  functions  of  living  organisms  ;  geology  studies  the 
formation  of  the  earth's  crust.  Or  if  two  or  more  of  them  in- 
vestigate the  same  subject-matter  they  do  so  from  different  stand- 
points, as  when  the  zoologist  and  the  physiologist  study  the 
same  type  or  specimen  in  the  animal  kingdom.  But  the  common 
feature  of  all  is  this,  that  each  seeks  only  the  reasons,  causes,  and 
laws  which  give  a  proximate  and  partial  explanation  of  the  facts 
which  it  investigates,  leaving  untouched  and  unsolved  a  number 
of  deeper  and  wider  questions  which  may  be  raised  about  the 
whence  and  whither  and  why,  not  only  of  the  facts  themselves, 
but  of  the  reasons,  causes  and  laws  assigned  by  the  particular 
science  in  explanation  of  these  facts. 

Now  it  is  those  deeper  and  wider  questions,  which  can  be 
answered  only  by  the  discovery  of  the  more  remote  and  ultimate 
reasons  and  causes  of  things,  that  philosophy  undertakes  to  in- 
vestigate, and — as  far  as  lies  within  man's  power — to  answer. 
No  one  has  ever  disputed  the  supreme  importance  of  such  in- 
quiries into  the  ultimate  reasons  and  causes  of  things — into  such 
questions  as  these,  for  instance  :  What  is  the  nature  of  man  him- 
self? Has  he  in  him  a  principle  of  life  which  is  spiritual  and 
immortal  ?  What  was  his  first  origin  on  the  earth  ?  Whence 
did  he  come  ?  Has  his  existence  any  purpose,  and  if  so,  what  ? 
Whither  does  he  tend  ?  What  is  his  destiny  ?  Why  does  he 
distinguish  between  a  right  and  a  wrong  in  human  conduct  ? 
What  is  the  ultimate  reason  or  ground  of  this  distinction  ?  Why 
have  men  generally  some  form  or  other  of  religion  ?  Why  do 
men  generally  believe  in  God  ?  Is  there  really  a  God  ?  What 
is  the  origin  of  the  whole  universe  of  man's  experience  ?  Of  life 
in  all  its  manifestations?  Has  the  universe  any  intelligible  or 
intelligent  purpose,  and  if  so,  what  ?  Can  the  human  mind  give 
a  certain  answer  to  any  of  these  or  similar  questions  ?  What 
about  the  nature  and  value  of  human  knowledge  itself?  What  is 
its  scope  and  what  are  its  limitations?  And  since  vast  multi- 
tudes of  men  believe  that  the  human  race  has  been  specially 


4  ONTOLOGY 

enlightened  by  God  Himself,  by  Divine  Revelation,  to  know  for 
certain  what  man's  destiny  is,  and  is  specially  aided  by  God 
Himself,  by  Divine  Grace,  to  work  out  this  destiny — the  question 
immediately  arises  :  What  are  the  real  relations  between  reason 
alone  on  the  one  hand  and  reason  enlightened  by  such  Revelation 
on  the  other,  in  other  words  between  natural  knowledge  and 
supernatural  faith? 

Now  it  will  be  admitted  that  the  special  sciences  take  us 
some  distance  along  the  road  towards  an  answer  to  such  questions, 
inasmuch  as  the  truths  established  by  these  sciences,  and  even 
the  wider  hypotheses  conceived  though  not  strictly  verified  in 
them,  furnish  us  with  most  valuable  data  in  our  investigation  of 
those  questions.  Similarly  the  alleged  fact  of  a  Divine  Revelation 
cannot  be  ignored  by  any  man  desirous  of  using  all  the  data 
available  as  helps  towards  their  solution.  The  Revelation  em- 
bodied in  Christianity  claims  not  merely  to  enlighten  us  in  regard 
to  many  ultimate  questions  which  mankind  would  be  able  to 
answer  without  its  assistance,  but  also  to  tell  us  about  our  destiny 
some  truths  of  supreme  import,  which  of  ourselves  we  should 
never  have  been  able  to  discover.  It  is  obvious,  then,  that 
whether  a  man  has  been  brought  up  from  his  infancy  to  believe 
in  the  Christian  Revelation  or  not,  his  whole  outlook  on  life  will 
be  determined  very  largely  by  his  belief  or  disbelief  in  its  authen- 
ticity and  its  contents.  Similarly,  if  he  be  a  Confucian,  or  a 
Buddhist,  or  a  Mohammedan,  his  outlook  will  be  in  part  de- 
termined by  what  he  believes  of  their  teachings.  Man's  conduct 
in  life  has  undoubtedly  many  determining  influences,  but  it  will 
hardly  be  denied  that  among  them  the  predominant  influence  is 
exerted  by  the  ^iews  that  he  holds,  the  things  he  believes  to  be 
true,  concerning  his  own  origin,  nature  and  destiny,  as  well  as  the 
origin,  nature  and  destiny  of  the  universe  in  which  he  finds  him- 
self. The  Germans  have  an  expressive  term  for  that  which,  in 
the  absence  of  a  more  appropriate  term,  we  may  translate  as  a 
man's  world-outlook  ;  they  call  it  his  Weltanschauung.  Now  this 
world-outlook  is  formed  by  each  individual  for  himself  from  his 
interpretation  of  his  experience  as  a  whole.  It  is  not  unusual  to 
call  this  world-outlook  a  man's  philosophy  of  life.  If  we  use  the 
term  philosophy  in  this  wide  sense  it  obviously  includes  whatever 
light  a  man  may  gather  from  the  special  sciences,  and  whatever 
light  he  may  gather  from  a  divinely  revealed  religion  if  he  believes 
in  such,  as  well  as  the  light  his  own  reason  may  shed  upon  a 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  5 

special  and  direct  study  of  those  ultimate  questions  themselves, 
to  which  we  have  just  referred.  But  we  mention  this  wide  sense 
of  the  term  philosophy  merely  to  put  it  aside  ;  and  to  state  that 
we  use  the  term  in  the  sense  more  commonly  accepted  nowadays, 
the  sense  in  which  it  is  understood  to  be  distinct,  from  the  special 
sciences  on  the  one  side  and  from  supernatural  theology  or  the 
systematic  study  of  divinely  revealed  religion  on  the  other. 
Philosophy  is  distinct  from  the  special  sciences  because  while  the 
latter  seek  the  proximate,  the  former  seeks  the  ultimate  grounds, 
reasons  and  causes  of  all  the  facts  of  human  experience.  Philo- 
sophy is  distinct  from  supernatural  theology  because  while  the 
former  uses  the  unaided  power  of  human  reason  to  study  the  ulti- 
mate questions  raised  by  human  experience,  the  latter  uses  reason 
enlightened  by  Divine  Revelation  to  study  the  contents  of  this 
Revelation  in  all  their  bearings  on  man's  life  and  destiny. 

Hence  we  arrive  at  this  simple  and  widely  accepted  definition 
of  philosophy  :  the  science  of  all  things  through  their  ultimate 
reasons  and  causes  as  discovered  by  the  unaided  light  of  human 
reason}*  The  first  part  of  this  definition  marks  off  philosophy 
from  the  special  sciences,  the  second  part  marks  it  off  from  super- 
natural theology. 

We  must  remember,  however,  that  these  three  departments  of  know- 
ledge —  scientific,  philosophical,  and  revealed  —  are  not  isolated  from  one 
another  in  any  man's  mind  ;  they  overlap  in  their  subject-matter,  and  though 
differing  in  their  respective  standpoints  they  permeate  one  another  through 
and  through.  The  separation  of  the  special  sciences  from  philosophy, 
though  adumbrated  in  the  speculations  of  ancient  times  and  made  more 
definite  in  the  middle  ages,  was  completed  only  in  modern  times  through  the 
growth  and  progress  of  the  special  sciences  themselves.  The  line  of  demar- 
cation between  philosophy  and  supernatural  theology  must  be  determined  by 
the  proper  relations  between  Reason  and  Faith  :  and  naturally  these  rela- 
tions are  a  subject  of  debate  between  philosophers  who  believe  in  the 
existence  of  an  authentic  Divine  Revelation  and  philosophers  who  do  not. 
It  is  the  duty  of  the  philosopher  as  such  to  determine  by  the  light  of  reason 
whether  a  Supreme  Being  exists  and  whether  a  Divine  Revelation  to  man  is 
possible.  If  he  convinces  himself  of  the  existence  of  God  he  will  have  little 
difficulty  in  inferring  Impossibility  of  a  Divine  Revelation.  The  fact  of  a 
Divine  Revelation  is  a  matter  not  for  philosophical  but  for  historical  research. 
Now  when  a  man  has  convinced  himself  of  the  existence  of  God  and  the 
fact  of  a  Divine  Revelation  —  \hzpreambulafidei  or  prerequisite  conditions  of 
Faith,  as  they  are  called  —  he  must  see  that  it  is  eminently  reasonable  for  him 


ffotyiav  irepl  ret  vpura  alfrto  /col  ras  d/J^os  inro\a/jLftdyov(ri 
—  ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.,  I.,  i.     "  Sapientia  [philosophia]  est  scientia  quae  considerat 
primas  et  universales  causas."  —  ST.  THOMAS,  In  Metaph.,  I.,  1.  2. 


6  ONTOLOGY 

to  believe  in  the  contents  of  such  Divine  Revelation ;  he  must  see  that  the 
truths  revealed  by  God  cannot  possibly  trammel  the  freedom  of  his  own 
reason  in  its  philosophical  inquiries  into  ultimate  problems  concerning  man 
and  the  universe  ;  he  must  see  that  these  truths  may  possibly  act  as  beacons 
which  will  keep  him  from  going  astray  in  his  own  investigations  :  knowing 
that  truth  cannot  contradict  truth  he  knows  that  if  he  reaches  a  conclusion 
really  incompatible  with  any  certainly  revealed  truth,  such  conclusion  must 
be  erroneous  ;  and  so  he  is  obliged  to  reconsider  the  reasoning  processes 
that  led  him  to  such  a  conclusion.1  Thus,  the  position  of  the  Christian 
philosopher,  aided  in  this  negative  way  by  the  truths  of  an  authentic  Divine 
Revelation,  has  a  distinct  advantage  over  that  of  the  philosopher  who  does 
not  believe  in  such  revelation  and  who  tries  to  solve  all  ultimate  questions 
independently  of  any  light  such  revelation  may  shed  upon  them.  Yet  the 
latter  philosopher  as  a  rule  not  only  regards  the  "  independent "  position, 
which  he  himself  takes  up  in  the  name  of  "  freedom  of  thought  "  and  "  free- 
dom of  research,"  as  the  superior  position,  but  as  the  only  one  consistent 
with  the  dignity  of  human  reason  ;  and  he  commonly  accuses  the  Christian 
philosopher  of  allowing  reason  to  be  "  enslaved "  in  "  the  shackles  of 
dogma ".  We  can  see  at  once  the  unfairness  of  such  a  charge  when  we 
remember  that  the  Christian  philosopher  has  convinced  himself  on  grounds  of 
reason  alone  that  God  exists  and  has  made  a  revelation  to  man.  His  belief 
in  a  Divine  Revelation  is  a  reasoned  belief,  a  rationabile  obsequium  (Rom. 
XII.  i) ;  and  only  if  it  were  a  blind  belief,  unjustifiable  on  grounds  of  reason, 
would  the  accusation  referred  to  be  a  fair  one.  The  Christian  philosopher 
might  retort  that  it  is  the  unbelieving  philosopher  himself  who  really  destroys 
"  freedom  of  thought  and  research,"  by  claiming  for  the  latter  what  is  really 
an  abuse  of  freedom,  namely  license  to  believe  what  reason  shows  to  be 
erroneous.  But  this  counter-charge  would  be  equally  unfair,  for  the  un- 
believing philosopher  does  not  claim  any  such  undue  license  to  believe  what 
he  knows  to  be  false  or  to  disbelieve  what  he  knows  to  be  true.  If  he  denies 
the  fact  or  the  possibility  of  a  Divine  Revelation,  and  therefore  pursues  his 
philosophical  investigations  without  any  regard  to  the  contents  of  such 
revelation,  it  is  because  he  has  convinced  himself  on  grounds  of  reason  that 
such  revelation  is  neither  a  fact  nor  a  possibility.  He  and  the  Christian 
philosopher  cannot  both  be  right ;  one  of  them  must  be  wrong  ;  but  as 
reasonable  men  they  should  agree  to  differ  rather  than  hurl  unjustifiable 
charges  and  counter-charges  at  each  other. 

All  philosophers  who  believe  in  the  Christian  Revelation  and  allow  its 
authentic  teachings  to  guide  and  supplement  their  own  rational  investiga- 
tion into  ultimate  questions,  are  keenly  conscious  of  the  consequent  superior 
depth  and  fulness  and  certitude  of  Christian  philosophy  as  compared  with  all 
the  other  conflicting  and  fragmentary  philosophies  that  mark  the  progress  of 
human  speculation  on  the  ultimate  problems  of  man  and  the  universe  down 
through  the  centuries.  They  feel  secure  in  the  possession  of  a  philosophia 

1 C/.  DE  WULF,  Scholasticism  Old  and  New,  pp.  59-61,  191-4 ;  History  of 
Medieval  Philosophy,  pp.  311-13  ;  also  two  articles  in  the  Irish  Ecclesiastical  Record 
(March  and  May,  1906)  on  Thoughts  on  Philosophy  and  Religion,  and  an  article  in 
the  Irish  Theological  Quarterly  (October,  1910)  on  Philosophy  and  Sectarianism  in 
Belfast  University,  by  the  present  writer. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  7 

perennis?  and  none  more  secure  than  those  of  them  who  complete  and  con- 
firm that  philosophy  by  the  only  full  and  authentic  deposit  of  Divinely  Re- 
vealed Truth,  which  is  to  be  found  in  the  teaching  of  the  Catholic  Church. 

The  history  of  philosophical  investigation  yields  no  one 
universally  received  conception  of  what  philosophy  is,  nor 
would  the  definition  given  above  be  unreservedly  accepted. 
Windelband,  in  his  History  of  Philosophy 2  instances  the  following 
predominant  conceptions  of  philosophy  according  to  the  chrono- 
logical order  in  which  they  prevailed  :  (a)  the  systematic  investiga- 
tion of  the  problems  raised  by  man  and  the  universe  (early 
Grecian  philosophy :  absence  of  differentiation  of  philosophy 
from  the  special  sciences) ;  (#)  the  practical  art  of  human  conduct, 
based  on  rational  speculation  (later  Grecian  philosophy :  distrust 
in  the  value  of  knowledge,  and  emphasis  on  practical  guidance 
of  conduct) ;  (<:)  the  helper  and  handmaid  of  the  Science  of  Re- 
vealed Truth,  i.e.  supernatural  theology,  in  the  solution  of 
ultimate  problems  (the  Christian  philosophy  of  the  Fathers  of  the 
Church  and  of  the  Medieval  Schools  down  to  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury :  universal  recognition  of  the  value  of  the  Christian  Revela- 
tion as  an  aid  to  rational  investigation);  (d)  a  purely  rational 
investigation  of  those  problems,  going  beyond  the  investigations 
of  the  special  sciences,  and  either  abstracting  from,  or  denying 
the  value  of,  any  light  or  aid  from  Revelation  (differentiation  of 
the  domains  of  science,  philosophy  and  theology ;  modern  philo- 
sophies from  the  sixteenth  to  the  nineteenth  century ;  excessive 
individualism  and  rationalism  of  these  as  unnaturally  divorced 
from  recognition  of,  and  belief  in,  Divine  Revelation,  and  unduly 
isolated  from  the  progressing  positive  sciences) ;  (e)  a  critical 
analysis  of  the  significance  and  scope  and  limitations  of  human 
knowledge  itself  (recent  philosophies,  mainly  concerned  with 
theories  of  knowledge  and  speculations  on  the  nature  of  the 
cognitive  process  and  the  reliability  of  its  products). 

These  various  conceptions  are  interesting  and  suggestive; 
much  might  be  said  about  them,  but  not  to  any  useful  purpose 
in  a  brief  introductory  chapter.  Let  us  rather,  adopting  the 
definition  already  set  forth,  try  next  to  map  out  into  its  leading 
departments  the  whole  philosophical  domain. 

III.  DIVISIONS  OF  PHILOSOPHY:  SPECULATIVE  AND  PRACTI- 

1  C/.  Encyclical  Aeterni  Patris,  on  Philosophical  Studies,  by  Pope  Leo  XIII., 
August  4,  1880. 

2  Introduction,  §  i. 


8  ONTOLOGY 

CAL  PHILOSOPHY.— The  general  problem  of  classifying  all  the 
sciences  built  up  by  human  thought  is  a  logical  problem  of  no 
little  complexity  when  one  tries  to  work  it  out  in  detail.  We 
refer  to  this  general  problem  only  to  mention  a  widely  accepted 
principle  on  which  it  is  usually  approached,  and  because  the 
division  of  philosophy  itself  is  a  section  of  the  general  problem. 
The  principle  in  question  is  that  sciences  may  be  distinguished 
indeed  by  partial  or  total  diversity  of  subject-matter^  but  that 
such  diversity  is  not  essential,  that  diversity  of  standpoint  is 
necessary  and  sufficient  to  constitute  distinct  sciences  even  when 
these  deal  with  one  and  the  same  subject-matter.  Now  applying 
this  principle  to  philosophy  we  see  firstly  that  it  has  the  same 
subject-matter  as  all  the  special  sciences  taken  collectively,  but 
that  it  is  distinct  from  all  of  them  inasmuch  as  it  studies  their 
data  not  from  the  standpoint  of  the  proximate  causes,  but  from 
the  higher  standpoint  of  the  ultimate  causes  of  these  data.  And 
we  see  secondly  that  philosophy,  having  this  one  higher  stand- 
point throughout  all  its  departments,  is  one  science ;  that  its 
divisions  are  only  material  divisions ;  that  there  is  not  a  plurality 
of  philosophies  as  there  is  a  plurality  of  sciences,  though  there  is 
a  plurality  of  departments  in  philosophy.1  Let  us  now  see  what 
these  departments  are. 

If  we  ask  why  people  seek  knowledge  at  all,  in  any  depart- 
ment, we  shall  detect  two  main  impelling  motives.  The  first  of 
these  is  simply  the  desire  to  know :  trahimur  omnes  cupiditate 
sciendi.  The  natural  feeling  of  wonder,  astonishment, ' '  admiratio? 
which  accompanies  our  perception  of  things  and  events,  prompts 
us  to  seek  their  causes,  to  discover  the  reasons  which  will  make 
them  intelligible  to  us  and  enable  us  to  understand  them.  But 
while  the  possession  of  knowledge  for  its  own  sake  is  thus  a 
motive  of  research  it  is  not  the  only  motive.  We  seek  know- 
ledge in  order  to  use  it  for  the  guidance  of  our  conduct  in  life, 
for  the  orientation  of  our  activities,  for  the  improvement  of  our 
condition  ;  knowing  that  knowledge  is  power,  we  seek  it  in  order 
to  make  it  minister  to  our  needs.  Now  in  the  degree  in  which 
it  fulfils  such  ulterior  purposes,  or  is  sought  for  these  purposes, 

1  As  a  brief  general  statement  of  the  matter  this  is  sufficiently  accurate  and 
will  not  be  misunderstood.  Of  course  the  general  standpoint  of  ultimate  causes 
and  reasons  admits  within  itself  some  variety  of  aspects.  Thus  Epistemology  and 
Psychology  deal  with  human  thought,  but  under  different  aspects ;  Psychology  and 
Ethics  deal  with  human  volition,  but  under  different  aspects,  etc. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  9 

knowledge  may  be  described  *s  practical ;  in  the  degree  in  which 
it  serves  no  ulterior  end,  or  is  sought  for  no  ulterior  end,  other 
than  that  of  perfecting  our  minds,  it  may  be  described  as  specu- 
lative. Of  course  this  latter  purpose  is  in  itself  a  highly  practical 
purpose ;  nor  indeed  is  there  any  knowledge,  however  speculative, 
but  has,  or  at  least  is  capable  of  having,  some  influence  or  bear- 
ing on  the  actual  tenor  and  conduct  of  our  lives;  and  in  this 
sense  all  knowledge  is  practical.  Still  we  can  distinguish  broadly 
between  knowledge  which  has  no  direct,  immediate  bearing  on 
our  acts,  and  knowledge  that  has.1  Hence  the  possibility  of 
distinguishing  between  two  great  domains  of  philosophical  know- 
ledge —  Theoretical  or  Speculative  Philosophy,  and  Practical 
Philosophy.  There  are,  in  fact,  two  great  domains  into  which 
the  data  of  all  human  experience  may  be  divided ;  and  for  each 
distinct  domain  submitted  to  philosophical  investigation  there 
will  be  a  distinct  department  of  philosophy.  A  first  domain  is 
the  order  realized  in  the  universe  independently  of  man  ;  a  second 
is  the  order  which  man  himself  realizes ;  things,  therefore,  and 
acts.  The  order  of  the  external  universe,  the  order  of  nature  as 
it  is  called,  exists  independently  of  us:  we  merely  study  it 
(speculari,  deepen),  we  do  not  create  it.  The  other  or  practical 
order  is  established  by  our  acts  of  intelligence  and  will,  and  by 
our  bodily  action  on  external  things  under  the  direction  of  those 
faculties  in  the  arts.  Hence  we  have  a  speculative  or  theoretical 
philosophy  and  a  practical  philosophy.2 

1  "  Theoreticus  sive  speculativus  intellectus,  in  hoc  proprie  ab  operative  sive 
practico  distinguitur,  quod  speculativus  habet  pro  fine  veritatem  quam  considerat, 
practicus  autem  veritatem  consideratam  ordinal  in  operationem  tamquam  in  finem ; 
et  ideo  differunt  ab  invicem  fine ;  finis  speculativae  est  veritas,  finis  operativae  sive 
practicae  actio." — ST.  THOMAS,  In  lib.  Boetii  de  Trinitate. 

2  Here  is  St.  Thomas'  exposition  and  justification  of  the  doctrine  in  the  text : 
"  Sapientis  est  ordinare.  Cujus  ratio  est,  quia  sapientia  est  potissima  perfectio  rationis, 
cujus  proprium  est  cognoscere  ordinem.  .  .  .  Ordo  autem  quadrupliciter  ad  rationem 
comparatur.     Est  enim  quidam  ordo   quem  ratio  non  facit,  sed  solum  considerat, 
sicut  est  ordo  rerum  naturalium.     Alius  autem  est  ordo,  quem  ratio  considerando 
facit  in  proprio  actu,  puta  cum  ordinal  conceptus  suos  ad  invicem,  et  signa  concep- 
tuum,  quae  sunt  voces  significativae.     Tertius  autem  est  quem  ratio  considerando 
facit  in  operationibus  voluntatis.     Quartus  autem  est  ordo  quem  ratio  considerando 
facit  in  exterioribus  rebus,  quarum  ipsa  est  causa,  sicut  in  area  et  domo.     Et  quia 
consideratio  rationis  per  habitum  perficitur,  secundum  hos  diversos  ordines  quos 
proprie  ratio  considerat,  sunt  diversae  scientiae.     Nam  ad  philosophiam  naturalem 
pertinet  considerare  ordinem  rerum  quem  ratio  humana  considerat  sed  non  facit ; 
ita  quod  sub  naturali  philosophia  comprehendamus  et  metaphysicam.     Ordo  autem 
quem  ratio  considerando  facit  in  proprio  actu,  pertinet  ad  rationalem  philosophiam, 
cujus  est  considerare  ordinem  partium  orationis  ad  invicem  et  ordinem  principiorum 
ad  invicem  et  ad  conclusiones.     Ordo  autem  actionum  voluntariarum  pertinet  ad 


io  ONTOLOGY 

IV.  DEPARTMENTS  OF  PRACTICAL  PHILOSOPHY:  LOGIC, 
ETHICS  AND  ESTHETICS. — In  the  domain  of  human  activities,  to 
the  right  regulation  of  which  practical  philosophy  is  directed,  we 
may  distinguish  two  departments  of  mental  activity,  namely  in- 
tellectual and  volitional^  and  besides  these  the  whole  department 
of  external^  executive  or  bodily  activity.  In  general  the  right 
regulation  of  acts  may  be  said  to  consist  in  directing  them  to  the 
realization  of  some  ideal ;  for  all  cognitive  acts  this  ideal  is  the 
true,  for  all  appetitive  or  volitional  acts  it  is  the  good,  while  for 
all  external  operations  it  may  be  either  the  beautiful  or  the  useful 
— the  respective  objects  of  the  fine  arts  and  the  mechanical  arts 
or  crafts. 

Logic,  as  a  practical  science,  studies  the  mental  acts  and  pro- 
cesses involved  in  discovering  and  proving  truths  and  systematiz- 
ing these  into  sciences,  with  a  view  to  directing  these  acts  and 
processes  aright  in  the  accomplishment  of  this  complex  task. 
Hence  it  has  for  its  subject-matter,  in  a  certain  sense,  all  the 
data  of  human  experience,  or  whatever  can  be  an  object  of  human 
thought.  But  it  studies  these  data  not  directly  or  in  themselves 
or  for  their  own  sake,  but  only  in  so  far  as  our  acts  of  reason,  which 
form  its  direct  object,  are  brought  to  bear  upon  them.  In  all  the 
other  sciences  we  employ  thought  to  study  the  various  objects  of 
thought  as  things,  events,  realities;  and  hence  these  may  be 
called  "  real "  sciences,  scientiae  reales  ;  while  in  Logic  we  study 
thought  itself,  and  even  here  not  speculatively  for  its  own  sake 
or  as  a  reality  (as  we  study  it  for  instance  in  Psychology),  but 
practically,  as  a  process  capable  of  being  directed  towards  the 
discovery  and  proof  of  truth ;  and  hence  in  contradistinction 
to  the  other  sciences  as  "real,"  we  call  Logic  the  "rational" 
science,  scientia  rationalis.  Scholastic  philosophers  express  this 
distinction  by  saying  that  while  Speculative  Philosophy  studies 
real  being  (Ens  Reale),  or  the  objects  of  direct  thought  (objecta 
primae  intentionis  mentis].  Logic  studies  the  being  which  is  the 
product  of  thought  (Ens  Rationis),  or  objects  of  reflex  thought 
(objecta  secundae  intentionis  mentis)}  The  mental  processes  in- 
volved in  the  attainment  of  scientific  truth  are  conception,  judg- 
ment and  inference ;  moreover  these  processes  have  to  be  exercised 
methodically  by  the  combined  application  of  analysis  and  syn- 

considerationem  moralis  philosophiae.  Ordo  autem  quern  ratio  considerando  facit  in 
rebus  exterioribus  constitutis  per  rationem  humanam,  pertinet  ad  artes  mechanicas."— 
In  X.  Ethic,  ad  Nichom.,  i.,  lect.  i. 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  Introduction,  ch.  ii.  and  iii. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  n 

thesis,  or  induction  and  deduction,  to  the  various  domains  of 
human  experience.  All  these  processes,  therefore,  and  the  methods 
of  their  application,  constitute  the  proper  subject-matter  of  Logic. 
It  has  been  more  or  less  a  matter  of  debate  since  the  days  of 
Aristotle  whether  Logic  should  be  regarded  as  a  department  of 
philosophical  science  proper,  or  rather  as  a  preparatory  discipline, 
an  instrument  or  organon  of  reasoning — as  the  collection  of  Aris- 
totle's own  logical  treatises  was  called, — and  so  as  a  vestibule  or 
introduction  to  philosophy.  And  there  is  a  similar  difference  of 
opinion  as  to  whether  or  not  it  is  advisable  to  set  down  Logic 
as  the  first  department  to  be  studied  in  the  philosophical  curri- 
culum. Such  doubts  arise  from  differences  of  view  as  to  the 
questions  to  be  investigated  in  Logic,  and  the  point  to  which  such 
investigations  should  be  carried  therein.  It  is  possible  to  dis- 
tinguish between  a  more  elementary  treatment  of  thought-processes 
with  the  avowedly  practical  aim  of  setting  forth  canons  of  infer- 
ence and  method  which  would  help  and  train  the  mind  to  reason 
and  investigate  correctly  ;  and  a  more  philosophical  treatment 
of  those  processes  with  the  speculative  aim  of  determining  their 
ultimate  significance  and  validity  as  factors  of  knowledge,  as 
attaining  to  truth,  as  productive  of  science  and  certitude.  It  is 
only  the  former  field  of  investigation  that  is  usually  accorded  to 
Logic  nowadays ;  and  thus  understood  Logic  ought  to  come  first 
in  the  curriculum  as  a  preparatory  training  for  philosophical 
studies,  accompanied,  however,  by  certain  elementary  truths  from 
Psychology  regarding  the  nature  and  functions  of  the  human 
mind.  The  other  domain  of  deeper  and  more  speculative  in- 
vestigation was  formerly  explored  in  what  was  regarded  as  a 
second  portion  of  logical  science,  under  the  title  of  "Critical" 
Logic — Logica  Critica.  In  modern  times  this  is  regarded  as  a 
distinct  department  of  Speculative  Philosophy,  under  the  various 
titles  of  Epistemology ,  Criteriology ,  or  the  Theory  of  Knowledge. 

Ethics  or  Moral  Philosophy  (^#0?,  mos,  mores,  morals,  conduct) 
is  that  department  of  practical  philosophy  which  has  for  its 
subject-matter  all  human  acts,  i.e.  all  acts  elicited  or  commanded 
by  the  will  of  man  considered  as  a  free,  rational  and  responsible 
agent.  And  it  studies  human  conduct  with  the  practical  purpose 
of  discovering  the  ultimate  end  or  object  of  this  conduct,  and  the 
principles  whereby  it  must  be  regulated  in  order  to  attain  to  this 
end.  Ethics  must  therefore  analyse  and  account  for  the  distinc- 
tion of  right  and  wrong  or  good  and  bad  in  human  conduct,  for 


12  ONTOLOGY 

its  feature  of  morality.  It  must  examine  the  motives  that 
influence  conduct :  pleasure,  well-being,  happiness,  duty,  obliga- 
tion, moral  law,  etc.  The  supreme  determining  factor  in  all 
such  considerations  will  obviously  be  the  ultimate  end  of  man> 
whatever  this  may  be  :  his  destiny  as  revealed  by  a  study  of  his 
nature  and  place  in  the  universe.  Now  the  nature  of  man  is 
studied  in  Psychology,  as  are  also  the  nature,  conditions  and 
effects  of  his  free  acts,  and  the  facilities,  dispositions  and  forms 
of  character  consequent  on  these.  Furthermore,  not  only  from 
the  study  of  man  in  Psychology,  but  from  the  study  of  the 
external  universe  in  Cosmology,  we  amass  data  from  which  in 
Natural  Theology  we  establish  the  existence  of  a  Supreme  Being. 
We  then  prove  in  Ethics  that  the  last  end  of  man,  his  highest 
perfection,  consists  in  knowing,  loving,  serving,  and  thus  glorify- 
ing God,  both  in  this  life  and  in  the  next.  Hence  we  can  see 
how  these  branches  of  speculative  philosophy  subserve  the 
practical  science  of  morals.  And  since  a  man's  interpretation  of 
the  moral  distinctions — as  of  right  or  wrong,  meritorious  or  blame- 
worthy, autonomous  or  of  obligation — which  he  recognizes  as 
pertaining  to  his  own  actions — since  his  interpretation  of  these 
distinctions  is  so  intimately  bound  up  with  his  religious  outlook 
and  beliefs,  it  is  at  once  apparent  that  the  science  of  Ethics  will 
be  largely  influenced  and  determined  by  the  system  of  speculative 
philosophy  which  inspires  it,  whether  this  be  Theism,  Monism, 
Agnosticism,  etc.  No  doubt  the  science  of  Ethics  must  take  as 
its  data  all  sorts  of  moral  beliefs,  customs  and  practices  prevalent 
at  any  time  among  men ;  but  it  is  not  a  speculative  science 
which  would  merely  aim  at  a  posteriori  inferences  or  inductive 
generalizations  from  these  data  ;  it  is  a  practical,  normative  science 
which  aims  at  discovering  the  truth  as  to  what  is  the  right  and 
the  wrong  in  human  conduct,  and  at  pointing  out  the  right 
application  of  the  principles  arising  out  of  this  truth.  Hence  it 
is  of  supreme  importance  for  the  philosopher  of  morals  to  deter- 
mine whether  the  human  race  has  really  been  vouchsafed  a 
Divine  Revelation,  and,  convincing  himself  that  Christianity 
contains  such  a  revelation,  to  recognize  the  possibility  of  supple- 
menting and  perfecting  what  his  own  natural  reason  can  discover 
by  what  the  Christian  religion  teaches  about  the  end  of  man  as 
the  supreme  determining  principle  of  human  conduct.  Not  that 
he  is  to  take  the  revealed  truths  of  Christianity  as  principles  of 
moral  philosophy  ;  for  these  are  the  principles  of  the  supernatural 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  13 

Christian  Theology  of  human  morals  ;  but  that  as  a  Christian 
philosopher,  i.e.  a  philosopher  who  recognizes  the  truth  of  the 
Christian  Revelation,  he  should  reason  out  philosophically  a 
science  of  Ethics  which,  so  far  as  it  goes,  will  be  in  harmony 
with  the  moral  teachings  of  the  Christian  Religion,  and  will 
admit  of  being  perfected  by  these.  This  recognition,  as  already 
remarked,  will  not  be  a  hindrance  but  a  help  to  him  in  ex- 
ploring the  wide  domains  of  the  individual,  domestic,  social 
and  religious  conduct  of  man  ;  in  determining,  on  the  basis  of 
theism  established  by  natural  reason,  the  right  moral  conditions 
and  relations  of  man's  conduct  as  an  individual,  as  a  member  of 
the  family,  as  a  member  of  the  state,  and  as  a  creature  of  God. 
The  nature,  source  and  sanction  of  authority,  domestic,  social 
and  religious  ;  of  the  dictate  of  conscience ;  of  the  natural  moral 
law  and  of  all  positive  law ;  of  the  moral  virtues  and  vices — 
these  are  all  questions  which  the  philosopher  of  Ethics  has  to 
explore  by  the  use  of  natural  reason,  and  for  the  investigation 
of  which  the  Christian  philosopher  of  Ethics  is  incomparably 
better  equipped  than  the  philosopher  who,  though  possessing  the 
compass  of  natural  reason,  ignores  the  beacon  lights  of  Divinely 
Revealed  Truths. 

Esthetics \  or  the  Philosophy  of  the  Fine  Arts,  is  that  department 
of  philosophy  which  studies  the  conception  of  the  beautiful  and 
its  external  expression  in  the  works  of  nature  and  of  man.  The 
arts  themselves,  of  course,  whether  concerned  with  the  realization 
of  the  useful  or  of  the  beautiful,  are  distinct  from  sciences,  even 
from  practical  sciences.1  The  technique  itself  consists  in  a  skill 
acquired  by  practice — by  practice  guided,  however,  by  a  set  of 
practical  canons  or  rules  which  are  the  ripe  fruit  of  experience.2 
But  behind  every  art  there  is  always  some  background  of  more  or 
less  speculative  truth.  The  conception  of  the  useful,  however, 
which  underlies  the  mechanical  arts  and  crafts,  is  not  an  ultimate 
conception  calling  for  any  further  analysis  than  it  receives  in  the 
various  special  sciences  and  in  metaphysics.  But  the  conception  of 
the  beautiful  does  seem  to  demand  a  special  philosophical  considera- 
tion. On  the  subjective  or  mental  side  the  esthetic  sense,  artistic 
taste,  the  sentiment  of  the  beautiful,  the  complex  emotions  ac- 
companying such  experience ;  on  the  objective  side  the  elements 

1  ARISTOTLE  and  the  scholastics  distinguished  between  the  domain  of  the  prac- 
tical (Trpao-ffu),  irpa|ts,  agere,  agibilia)  and  the  operative  or  productive  (irote?f,  Trol-rjcris, 
facere,factibilia). 

2  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §  8. 


14  ONTOLOGY 

or  factors  requisite  to  produce  this  experience  ;  the  relation  of 
the  esthetic  to  the  moral,  of  the  beautiful  to  the  good  and  the 
true — these  are  all  distinctly  philosophical  questions.  Up  to  the 
present  time,  however,  their  treatment  has  been  divided  between 
the  other  departments  of  philosophy — psychology,  cosmology, 
natural  theology,  general  metaphysics,  ethics — rather  than  grouped 
together  to  form  an  additional  distinct  department. 

V.  DEPARTMENTS  OF  SPECULATIVE  PHILOSOPHY  :  META- 
PHYSICS.— The  philosophy  which  studies  the  order  realized  in 
things  apart  from  our  activity,  speculative  philosophy,  has  been 
variously  divided  up  into  separate  departments  from  the  first 
origins  of  philosophical  speculation. 

When  we  remember  that  all  intellectual  knowledge  of  things 
involves  the  apprehension  of  general  truths  or  laws  about  these 
things,  and  that  this  apprehension  of  intelligible  aspects  common 
to  a  more  or  less  extensive  group  of  things  involves  the  exercise 
of  abstraction,  we  can  understand  how  the  whole  domain  of  specu- 
lative knowledge,  whether  scientific  or  philosophical,  can  be  dif- 
ferentiated into  certain  layers  or  levels,  so  to  speak,  according  to 
various  degrees  of  abstractness  and  universality  in  the  intelligible 
aspects  under  which  the  data  of  our  experience  may  be  considered. 
On  this  principle  Aristotle  and  the  scholastics  divided  all  specu- 
lative knowledge  into  three  great  domains,  Physics,  Mathematics 
and  Metaphysics,  with  their  respective  proper  objects,  Change, 
Quantity  and  Being,  objects  which  are  successively  apprehended  in 
three  great  stages  of  abstraction  traversed  by  the  human  mind  in 
its  effort  to  understand  and  explain  the  Universal  Order  of  things. 

And  as  a  matter  of  fact  perhaps  the  first  great  common  and 
most  obvious  feature  which  strikes  the  mind  reflecting  on  the 
visible  universe  is  the  feature  of  all-pervading  change  (icivvja-t^ 
movement,  evolution,  progress  and  regress,  growth  and  decay ; 
we  see  it  everywhere  in  a  variety  of  forms,  mechanical  or  local 
change,  quantitative  change,  qualitative  change,  vital  change. 
Now  the  knowledge  acquired  by  the  study  of  things  under  this 
common  aspect  is  called  Physics.  Here  the  mind  abstracts  merely 
from  the  individualizing  differences  of  this  change  in  individual 
things,  and  fixes  its  attention  on  the  great,  common,  sensible 
aspect  itself  of  visible  change. 

But  the  mind  can  abstract  even  from  the  sensible  changes 
that  take  place  in  the  physical  universe  and  fix  its  attention  on 
a  static  feature  in  the  changing  things.  This  static  element 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  15 

(TO  aKivyrov),  which  the  intellect  apprehends  in  material  things 
as  naturally  inseparable  from  them  (a/civvjTov  a\\'  ov  ^copicrrov), 
is  their  quantity ',  their  extension  in  space.  When  the  mind  strips 
a  material  object  of  all  its  visible,  sensible  properties — on  which 
its  mechanical,  physical  and  chemical  changes  depend — there 
still  remains  as  an  object  of  thought  a  something  formed  of  parts 
outside  parts  in  three  dimensions  of  space.  This  abstract  quantity, 
quantitas  intelligibilis — whether  as  continuous  or  discontinuous, 
as  magnitude  or  multitude — is  the  proper  object  of  Mathematics. 

But  the  mind  can  penetrate  farther  still  into  the  reality  of 
the  material  data  which  it  finds  endowed  with  the  attributes  of 
change  and  quantity :  it  can  eliminate  from  the  object  of  its 
thought  even  this  latter  or  mathematical  attribute,  and  seize  on 
something  still  more  fundamental.  The  very  essence,  substance, 
nature,  being  itself,  of  the  thing,  the  underlying  subject  and  root 
principle  of  all  the  thing's  operations  and  attributes,  is  something 
deeper  than  any  of  these  attributes,  something  at  least  mentally 
distinct  from  these  latter  (TO  CLKLVIJTOV  KCLI  %o)pto-Toi/)  :  and  this 
something  is  the  proper  object  of  man's  highest  speculative 
knowledge,  which  Aristotle  called  rj  irp^r^  <pi\oo-o(j)ia, philosophia 
primay  the  first  or  fundamental  or  deepest  philosophy.1 

But  he  gave  this  latter  order  of  knowledge  another  very 
significant  title :  he  called  it  theology  or  theological  science, 
eTTia-Trj/jLT)  QeoXoyi/crf,  by  a  denomination  derived  a  potiori  parte, 
from  its  nobler  part,  its  culmination  in  the  knowledge  of  God. 
Let  us  see  how.  For  Aristotle  first  philosophy  is  the  science  of 
being  and  its  essential  attributes?  Here  the  mind  apprehends  its 

J"  Quaedam  igitur  sunt  speculabilium  quae  dependent  a  materia  secundum 
esse,  quia  non  nisi  in  materia  esse  possunt,  et  haec  distinguuntur  quia  dependent 
quaedam  a  materia  secundum  esse  et  intellectum,  sicut  ilia  in  quorum  definitione 
ponitur  materia  sensibilis  :  unde  sine  materia  sensibili  intelligi  non  possunt ;  ut  in 
definitione  hominis  oportet  accipere  carnem  et  ossa :  et  de  his  est  physica  sive 
scientia  naturalis.  Quaedam  vero  sunt  quae,  quamvis  dependeant  a  materia  sensibili 
secundum  esse,  non  tamen  secundum  intellectum,  quia  in  eorum  definitionibus  non 
ponitur  materia  sensibilis,  ut  linea  et  numerus  :  et  de  his  est  mathematica.  Quasdam 
vero  sunt  speculabilia  quae  non  dependent  a  materia  secundum  esse,  quia  sine 
materia  esse  possunt :  sive  nunquam  sint  in  materia,  sicut  Deus  et  angelus,  sive  in 
quibusdam  sint  in  materia  et  in  quibusdam  non,  ut  substantia,  qualitas,  potentia  et 
actus,  unum  et  multa,  etc.,  de  quibus  omnibus  est  theologia,  id  est  scientia  divina, 
quia  prascipuum  cognitorum  in  ea  est  Deus.  Alio  nomine  dicitur  metaphysica,  id 
est,  transphysica,  quia  post  physicam  dicenda  occurrit  nobis,  quibus  ex  sensibilibus 
competit  in  insensibilia  devenire.  Dicitur  etiam  philosophia  prima,  in  quantum 
scientiae  alias  ab  ea  principia  sua  accipientes  earn  sequuntur." — ST.  THOMAS,  In 
lib.  Boetii  de  Trinitate,  q.  5,  a.  i. 

2  'ETTti>  eVto-T^rj  ns  $)  flewpe?  rb  ov  y  ov  KO,I  rovrcp  vvdpxovra  Ka.ffa.irr 6. — Metaph. 
III.,  i  (ed.  Didot). 


1 6  ONTOLOGY 

object  as  static  or  abstracted  from  change,  and  as  immaterial  or 
abstracted  from  quantity,  the  fundamental  attribute  of  material 
reality — as  aicLvrjrov  ical  ^aypLcrrov.  Now  it  is  the  substance, 
nature,  or  essence  of  the  things  of  our  direct  and  immediate  experi- 
ence^ that  forms  the  proper  object  of  this  highest  science.  But  in 
these  things  the  substance,  nature,  or  essence,  is  not  found  in 
real  and  actual  separation  from  the  material  attributes  of  change 
and  quantity ;  it  is  considered  separately  from  these  only  by  an 
effort  of  mental  abstraction.  Even  the  nature  of  man  himself  is 
not  wholly  immaterial  ;  nor  is  the  spiritual  principle  in  man,  his 
soul,  entirely  exempt  from  material  conditions.  Hence  in  so  far 
as  first  philosophy  studies  the  being  of  the  things  of  our  direct 
experience,  its  object  is  immaterial  only  negatively  or  by  mental 
abstraction.  But  does  this  study  bring  within  the  scope  of  our 
experience  any  being  or  reality  that  is  positively  and  actually 
exempt  from  all  change  and  all  material  conditions  ?  If  so  the 
study  of  this  being,  the  Divine  Being,  will  be  the  highest  effort, 
the  crowning  perfection,  of  first  philosophy ',  which  we  may  there- 
fore call  the  theological  science.  "If,"  writes  Aristotle,1  "there 
really  exists  a  substance  absolutely  immutable  and  immaterial, 
in  a  word,  a  Divine  Being — as  we  hope  to  prove — then  such 
Being  must  be  the  absolutely  first  and  supreme  principle,  and 
the  science  that  attains  to  such  Being  will  be  theological." 

In  this  triple  division  of  speculative  philosophy  into  Physics, 
Mathematics,  and  Metaphysics,  it  will  naturally  occur  to  one 
to  ask  :  Did  Aristotle  distinguish  between  what  he  called  Physics 
and  what  we  nowadays  call  the  special  physical  sciences  ?  He 
did.  These  special  analytic  studies  of  the  various  departments 
of  the  physical  universe,  animate  and  inanimate,  Aristotle  de- 
scribed indiscriminately  as  "  partial  "  sciences  :  al  ev  fjuepet,  eVicrn;- 
fLon, — eTrio-rrj^al  eV  pepet,  \eyo/j,evai,.  These  descriptive,  inductive, 
comparative  studies,  proceeding  a  posteriori  from  effects  to  causes, 
he  conceived  rather  as  a  preparation  for  scientific  knowledge 
proper ;  this  latter  he  conceived  to  be  a  synthetic,  deductive 
explanation  of  things,  in  the  light  of  some  common  aspect  de- 
tected in  them  as  principle  or  cause  of  all  their  concrete  char- 
acteristics.2 Such  synthetic  knowledge  of  things,  in  the  light  of 
some  such  common  aspect  as  change,  is  what  he  regarded  as 
scientific  knowledge,  meaning  thereby  what  we  mean  by  philo- 

1  Metaph.  X.,  ch.  vii.,  5  and  6. 

2  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §§  251-5. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  17 

sophical  knowledge.1    What  he  called  Physics,  therefore,  is  what 
we  nowadays  understand  as  Cosmology  and  Psychology? 

Mathematical  science  Aristotle  likewise  regarded  as  science 
in  the  full  and  perfect  sense,  i.e.  as  philosophical.  But  just  as 
we  distinguish  nowadays  between  the  special  physical  and  human 
sciences  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  philosophy  of  external  nature 
and  man  on  the  other,  so  we  may  distinguish  between  the  special 
mathematical  sciences  and  a  Philosophy  of  Mathematics  :  with 
this  difference,  that  while  the  former  groups  of  special  sciences 
are  mainly  inductive  the  mathematical  group  is  mainly  deductive. 
Furthermore,  the  Philosophy  of  Mathematics — which  investigates 
questions  regarding  the  ultimate  significance  of  mathematical 
concepts,  axioms  and  assumptions  :  unity,  multitude,  magnitude, 
quantity,  space,  time,  etc. — does  not  usually  form  a  separate  de- 
partment in  the  philosophical  curriculum  :  its  problems  are  dealt 
with  as  they  arise  in  the  other  departments  of  Metaphysics. 

Before  outlining  the  modern  divisions  of  Metaphysics  we 
may  note  that  this  latter  term  was  not  used  by  Aristotle.  We 
owe  it  probably  to  Andronicus  of  Rhodes  (f  40  B.C.),  who,  when 
arranging  a  complete  edition  of  Aristotle's  works,  placed  next  in 
order  after  the  Physics,  or  physical  treatises,  all  the  parts  and 
fragments  of  the  master's  works  bearing  upon  the  immutable  and 
immaterial  object  of  the  philosophia  prima  ;  these  he  labelled 
TO,  /j,era  T^L  (/&/3Xta)  <j>vcrtKa,  post  physica,  the  books  after  the 
physics :  hence  the  name  metaphysics -,3  applied  to  this  highest 
section  of  speculative  philosophy.  It  was  soon  noticed  that  the 
term,  thus  fortuitously  applied  to  such  investigations,  conveyed  a 
very  appropriate  description  of  their  scope  and  character  if  inter- 
preted in  the  sense  of  "  .ra/ra-physica,"  or  "  trans-physica  "  :  in- 

1  When  the  term  "  science  "  is  used  nowadays  in  contradistinction  to  "philo- 
sophy," it  usually  signifies  the  knowledge  embodied  in  what  are  called  the  special, 
or  positive,  or  inductive  sciences — a  knowledge  which  Aristotle  would  not  regard 
as  strictly  or  fully  scientific. 

2  Aristotle's  conception  of  the  close  relation  between  Physics  (or  the  Philosophy 
of  Nature)  and  those  analytic  studies  which  we  nowadays  describe  as  the  physical 
sciences,  bears  witness  to  the  close  alliance  which  he  conceived  to  exist  between 
sense  observation  on  the  one  hand  and  rational  speculation  on  the  other.     This 
sane  view  of  the  continuity  of  human  knowledge,  a  view  to  which  the  Schoolmen  of 
the  Middle  Ages  were  ever  faithful,  was  supplanted  at  the  dawn  of  modern  philo- 
sophy in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  by  the  opposite  view,  which  led  to 
a  divorce  between  physics  and  metaphysics,  and  to  a  series  of  misunderstandings 
which  still  prevail  with  equal  detriment  to  science  and  philosophy  alike. 

3C/.  DE  WULF,  History  of  Medieval  Philosophy,  pp.  28-9,  66;  MERCIER, 
Ontologie,  Introd.,  p.  v.,  n. 

2 


18  ONTOLOGY 

asmuch  as  the  object  of  these  investigations  is  a  hyperphysical 
object,  an  object  that  is  either  positively  and  really,  or  negatively 
and  by  abstraction,  beyond  the  material  conditions  of  quantity 
and  change.  St.  Thomas  combines  both  meanings  of  the  term 
when  he  says  that  the  study  of  its  subject-matter  comes  naturally 
after  the  study  of  physics,  and  that  we  naturally  pass  from  the 
study  of  the  sensible  to  that  of  the  suprasensible.1 

The  term  philosophia prima  has  now  only  an  historical  interest ; 
and  the  term  theology -,  used  without  qualification,  is  now  generally 
understood  to  signify  supernatural  theology. 

VI.  DEPARTMENTS  OF  METAPHYSICS:  COSMOLOGY,  PSYCH- 
OLOGY, AND  NATURAL  THEOLOGY.— Nowadays  the  term  Meta- 
physics is  understood  as  synonymous  with  speculative  philosophy  : 
the  investigation  of  the  being,  nature,  or  essence,  and  essential 
attributes  of  the  realities  which  are  also  studied  in  the  various 
special  sciences  :  the  search  for  the  ultimate  grounds,  reasons 
and  causes  of  these  realities,  of  which  the  proximate  explanations 
are  sought  in  the  special  sciences.  We  have  seen  that  it  has  for 
its  special  object  that  most  abstract  aspect  of  reality  whereby 
the  latter  is  conceived  as  changeless  and  immaterial ;  and  we 
have  seen  that  a  being  may  have  these  attributes  either  by 
mental  abstraction  merely,  or  in  actual  reality.  In  other  words 
the  philosophical  study  of  things  that  are  really  material  not 
only  suggests  the  possibility,  but  establishes  the  actual  existence, 
of  a  Being  that  is  really  changeless  and  immaterial :  so  that 
metaphysics  in  all  its  amplitude  would  be  the  philosophical  science 
of  things  that  are  negatively  (by  abstraction)  or  positively  (in 
reality)  immaterial.  This  /  distinction  suggests  a  division  of 
metaphysics  into  general  and  special  metaphysics.  The  former 
would  be  the  philosophical  study  of  all  being,  considered  by 
mental  abstraction  as  immaterial ;  the  latter  would  be  the  philo- 
sophical study  of  the  really  and  positively  changeless  and  im- 
material Being, — God.  The  former  would  naturally  fall  into  two 
great  branches  :  the  study  of  inanimate  nature  and  the  study  of 
living  things,  Cosmology  and  Psychology ;  while  special  meta- 
physics, the  philosophical  study  of  the  Divine  Being,  would 
constitute  Natural  Theology.  These  three  departments,  one  of 
special  metaphysics  and  two  of  general  metaphysics,  would  not 

1  "  Dicitur  metaphysica  [scientia]  id  est,  transphysica,  quia  post  physicam 
dicenda  occurrit  nobis,  quibus  ex  sensibilibus  competit  in  insensibilia  devenire." 
—ST.  THOMAS,  In  Lib.  Boetii  de  Trinitate,  q.  5,  a.  i. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  19 

be  three  distinct  philosophical  sciences,  but  three  departments  of 
the  one  speculative  philosophical  science.  The  standpoint  would 
be  the  same  in  all  three  sections,  viz.  being  considered  as  static 
and  immaterial  by  mental  abstraction:  for  whatever  positive 
knowledge  we  can  reach  about  being  that  is  really  immaterial 
can  be  reached  only  through  concepts  derived  from  material 
being  and  applied  analogically  to  immaterial  being. 

Cosmology  and  Psychology  divide  between  them  the  whole 
domain  of  man's  immediate  experience.  Cosmology,  utilizing 
not  only  the  data  of  direct  experience,  but  also  the  conclusions 
established  by  the  analytic  study  of  these  data  in  the  physical 
sciences,  explores  the  origin,  nature,  and  destiny  of  the  material 
universe.  Some  philosophers  include  among  the  data  of  Cos- 
mology all  the  phenomena  of  vegetative  life,  reserving  sentient 
and  rational  life  for  Psychology  ;  others  include  even  sentient 
life  in  Cosmology,  reserving  the  study  of  human  life  for  Psycho- 
logy, or,  as  they  would  call  it,  Anthropology.1  The  mere  matter 
of  location  is  of  secondary  importance.  Seeing,  however,  that 
man  embodies  in  himself  all  three  forms  of  life,  vegetative,  sentient, 
and  rational,  all  three  would  perhaps  more  naturally  belong  to 
Psychology,  which  would  be  the  philosophical  study  of  life  in 
all  its  manifestations  (^^%^,  the  vital  principle,  the  soul).  Just 
as  the  conclusions  of  the  physical  sciences  are  the  data  of  Cos- 
mology, so  the  conclusions  of  the  natural  or  biological  sciences — 
Zoology,  Botany,  Physiology,  Morphology,  Cellular  Biology, 
etc. — are  the  data  of  Psychology.  Indeed  in  Psychology  itself — 
especially  in  more  recent  years — it  is  possible  to  distinguish  a 
positive,  analytic,  empirical  study  of  the  phenomena  of  conscious- 
ness, a  study  which  would  rank  rather  as  a  special  than  as  an 
ultimate  or  philosophical  science ;  and  a  synthetic,  rational  study 
of  the  results  of  this  analysis,  a  study  which  would  be  strictly 
philosophical  in  character.  This  would  have  for  its  object  to 
determine  the  origin,  nature  and  destiny  of  living  things  in 
general  and  of  man  himself  in  particular.  It  would  inquire  into 
the  nature  and  essential  properties  of  living  matter,  into  the  nature 
of  the  subject  of  conscious  states,  into  the  operations  and  faculties 
of  the  human  mind,  into  the  nature  of  the  human  soul  and  its 
mode  of  union  with  the  body,  into  the  rationality  of  the  human 

1  This  is  also  the  title  of  the  social  and  ethnological  study  of  the  various  races 
of  men,  their  primitive  habits,  customs,  institutions,  etc. 


20  ONTOLOGY 

intellect  and  the  freedom  of  the  human  will,  the  spirituality  and 
immortality  of  the  human  soul,  etc. 

But  since  the  human  mind  itself  is  the  natural  instrument 
whereby  man  acquires  all  his  knowledge,  it  will  be  at  once  ap- 
parent that  the  study  of  the  phenomenon  of  knowledge  itself,  of 
the  cognitive  activity  of  the  mind,  can  be  studied,  and  must  be 
studied,  not  merely  as  a  natural  phenomenon  of  the  mind,  but 
from  the  point  of  view  of  its  special  significance  as  representative 
of  objects  other  than  itself,  from  the  point  of  view  of  its  validity 
or  invalidity,  its  truth  or  falsity,  and  with  the  special  aim  of  de- 
termining the  scope  and  limitations  and  conditions  of  its  objective 
validity.  We  have  already  referred  to  the  study  of  human  know- 
ledge from  this  standpoint,  in  connexion  with  what  was  said 
above  concerning  Logic.  It  has  a  close  kinship  with  uLogic  on 
the  one  hand,  and  with  Psychology  on  the  other ;  and  nowadays 
it  forms  a  distinct  branch  of  speculative  Philosophy  iunder  the 
title  of  Criteriology,  Epistemology,  or  the  Theory  of  Knowledge. 

Arising  out  of  the  data  of  our  direct  experience,  external  and 
internal,  as  studied  in  the  philosophical  departments  just  outlined, 
we  find  a  variety  of  evidences  all  pointing  beyond  the  domain  of 
this  direct  experience  to  the  supreme  conclusion  that  there  exists 
of  necessity,  distinct  from  this  directly  experienced  universe,  as 
its  Creator,  Conserver,  and  Ruler,  its  First  Beginning  and  its  Last 
End,  its  Alpha  and  Omega,  One  Divine  and  Infinite  Being,  the 
Deity.  The  existence  and  attributes  of  the  Deity,  and  the  re- 
lations of  man  and  the  universe  to  the  Deity,  form  the  subject- 
matter  of  Natural  Theology. 

VII.  DEPARTMENTS  OF  METAPHYSICS  :  ONTOLOGY  AND 
EPISTEMOLOGY. — According  to  the  Aristotelian  and  scholastic  con- 
ception speculative  philosophy  would  utilize  as  data  the  conclusions 
of  the  special  sciences — physical,  biological,  and  human.  It  would 
try  to  reach  a  deeper  explanation  of  their  data  by  synthesizing 
these  under  the  wider  aspects  of  change,  quantity,  and  being,  thus 
bringing  to  light  the  ultimate  causes,  reasons,  and  explanatory 
principles  of  things.  This  whole  study  would  naturally  fall  into 
two  great  branches:  General  Metaphysics  (Cosmology  and 
Psychology),  which  would  study  things  exempt  from  quantity 
and  change  not  really  but  only  by  mental  abstraction  ;  and 
Special  Metaphysics  (Natural  Theology],  which  would  study  the 
positively  immaterial  and  immutable  Being  of  the  Deity. 

This  division  of  Metaphysics,  thoroughly  sound  in  principle, 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  21 

and  based  on  a  sane  and  rational  view  of  the  relation  between 
the  special  sciences  and  philosophy,  has  been  almost  entirely l 
supplanted  in  modern  times  by  a  division  which,  abstracting  from 
the  erroneous  attitude  that  prompted  it  in  the  first  instance,  has 
much  to  recommend  it  from  the  standpoint  of  practical  conven- 
ience of  treatment.  The  modern  division  was  introduced  by 
Wolff  (1679-1755),  a  German  philosopher, — a  disciple  of  Leibniz 
(1646-1716)  and  forerunner  of  Kant  (i724-i8o4).2  Influenced 
by  the  excessively  deductive  method  of  Leibniz'  philosophy, 
which  he  sought  to  systematize  and  to  popularize,  he  wrongly  con- 
ceived the  metaphysical  study  of  reality  as  something  wholly 
apart  and  separate  from  the  inductive  investigation  of  this  same 
reality  in  the  positive  sciences.  It  comprised  the  study  of  the 
most  fundamental  and  essential  principles  of  being,  considered  in 
themselves  ;  and  the  deductive  application  of  these  principles  to 
the  three  great  domains  of  actual  reality,  the  corporeal  universe, 
the  human  soul,  and  God.  The  study  of  the  first  principles  of 
being  in  themselves  would  constitute  General  Metaphysics,  or 
Ontology  (oz>ro9-Xo709).  Their  applications  would  constitute  three 
great  departments  of  Special  Metaphysics :  Cosmology,  which  he 
described  as  '  ( transcendental  "  in  opposition  to  the  experimental 
physical  sciences  ;  Psychology,  which  he  termed  "  rational "  in  op- 
position to  the  empirical  biological  sciences  ;  and  finally  Natural 
Theology,  which  he  entitled  Theodicy  (Oeos-Sitcrj-Si/caioo)),  using 
a  term  invented  by  Leibniz  for  his  essays  in  vindication  of  the 
wisdom  and  justice  of  Divine  Providence  notwithstanding  the 
evils  of  the  universe. 

"The  spirit  that  animated  this  arrangement  of  the  departments  of  meta- 
physics," writes  Mercier,  "was  unsound  in  theory  and  unfortunate  in  tendency. 
It  stereotyped  for  centuries  a  disastrous  divorce  between  philosophy  and  the 

1  Not  entirely  ;  for  instance,  what  is  perhaps  the  most  comprehensive  course  of 
philosophy  published  in  recent  times,  the  Philosophic*  Lacensis  (n  vols.,  Herder, 
1888-1900)  apparently  follows  the  arrangement  of  metaphysics  outlined  above.    The 
fundamental  questions  on  knowing  and  being,  which  usually  constitute  distinct  de- 
partments under  the  respective  titles  of  Epistemology  and  Ontology,  are  here  treated 
under  the  comprehensive  title  of  Institutiones  Logicales  (3  vols.).     However,  they 
are  really  metaphysical  problems,  problems  of  speculative  philosophy,  wherever 
they  be  treated  ;  and  the  fact  that  the  questions  usually  treated  in  Ontology  are 
here  treated  in  a  volume  apart  (vol.  iii.  of  the  Institutiones  Logicales :  under  the 
peculiar  title  of  Logica  Realis),  and  not  in  the  volumes  assigned  to  general  meta- 
physics, shows  the  necessity  and  convenience  of  the  more  modern  arrangement. 
General  metaphysics  are  dealt  with  in  2  vols.  of  Institutiones  Philosophiae  Naturalis 
and  3  vols.  of  Institutiones  Psychologicae ;  special  metaphysics  in  the  Institutiones 
Theodicaae  (i  vol.) ;  ethics  in  2  vols.  of  Institutiones  Juris  Naturae. 

2  C/.  TURNER,  History  of  Philosophy,  p.  525. 


22  ONTOLOGY 

sciences,  a  divorce  that  had  its  origin  in  circumstances  peculiar  to  the  intel- 
lectual atmosphere  of  the  early  eighteenth  century.  As  a  result  of  it  there 
was  soon  no  common  language  or  understanding  between  scientists  and 
philosophers.  The  terms  which  expressed  the  most  fundamental  ideas — 
matter,  substance,  movement,  cause,  force,  energy,  and  such  like — were 
taken  in  different  senses  in  science  and  in  philosophy.  Hence  misunderstand- 
ings, aggravated  by  a  growing  mutual  distrust  and  hostility,  until  finally  people 
came  to  believe  that  scientific  and  metaphysical  preoccupations  were  incom- 
patible if  not  positively  opposed  to  each  other." 1 

How  very  different  from  the  disintegrating  conception  here  criticized  is 
the  traditional  Aristotelian  and  scholastic  conception  of  the  complimentary 
functions  of  philosophy  and  the  sciences  in  unifying  human  knowledge :  a 
conception  thus  eloquently  expressed  by  NEWMAN  in  his  Idea  of  a  Uni- 
versity : — * 

"All  that  exists,  as  contemplated  by  the  human  mind,  forms  one  large 
system  or  complex  fact.  .  .  .  Now,  it  is  not  wonderful  that,  with  all  its  capa- 
bilities, the  human  mind  cannot  take  in  this  whole  vast  fact  at  a  single 
glance,  or  gain  possession  of  it  at  once.  Like  a  short-sighted  reader,  its  eye 
pores  closely,  and  travels  slowly,  over  the  awful  volume  which  lies  open  for  its 
inspection.  Or  again,  as  we  deal  with  some  huge  structure  of  many  parts 
and  sides,  the  mind  goes  round  about  it,  noting  down,  first  one  thing,  then 
another,  as  best  it  may,  and  viewing  it  under  different  aspects,  by  way  of 
making  progress  towards  mastering  the  whole.  .  .  .  These  various  partial 
views  or  abstractions  .  .  .  are  called  sciences  .  .  .  they  proceed  on  the 
principle  of  a  division  of  labour.  ...  As  they  all  belong  to  one  and  the  same 
circle  of  objects,  they  are  one  and  all  connected  together  ;  as  they  are  but 
aspects  of  things,  they  are  severally  incomplete  in  their  relation  to  the  things 
themselves,  though  complete  in  their  own  idea  and  for  their  own  respective 
purposes  ;  on  both  accounts  they  at  once  need  and  subserve  each  other.  And 
further,  the  comprehension  of  the  bearings  of  one  science  on  another,  and 
the  use  of  each  to  each,  and  the  location  and  limitation  and  adjustment 
and  due  appreciation  of  them  all,  one  with  another,  this  belongs,  I  conceive, 
to  a  sort  of  science  distinct  from  all  of  them,  and  in  some  sense,  a  science  of 
sciences,  which  is  my  own  conception  of  what  is  meant  by  Philosophy.  ..." 

Without  in  any  way  countenancing  such  an  isolation  of 
metaphysics  from  the  positive  sciences,  we  may,  nevertheless, 
adopt  the  modern  division  in  substance  and  in  practice.  While 
recognizing  the  intimate  connexion  between  the  special  sciences 
and  metaphysics  in  all  its  branches,  we  may  regard  as  General 
Metaphysics  all  inquiries  into  the  fundamental  principles  of  being 
and  of  knowing,  of  reality  and  of  knowledge ;  and  as  Special 
Metaphysics  the  philosophical  study  of  physical  nature,  of  human 
nature,  and  of  God,  the  Author  and  Supreme  Cause  of  all  finite 
reality.  Thus,  while  special  metaphysics  would  embrace  Cos- 
mology, Psychology,  and  Natural  Theology,  general  metaphysics 

1  MERCIER,  Logique,  Introd.,  §  9,  2  pp.  45,  51. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  23 

would  embrace  Ontology  and  Epistemology.  These  two  latter 
disciplines  must  no  doubt  investigate  what  is  in  a  certain  sense 
one  and  the  same  subject-matter,  inasmuch  as  knowledge  is 
knowledge  of  reality,  nor  can  the  knowing  mind  (the  subjectum 
cognoscens]  and  the  known  reality  (the  objectum  cognitum}  be 
wholly  separated  or  studied  in  complete  isolation  from  each 
other.  Yet  the  whole  content  of  human  experience,  which 
forms  their  common  subject-matter,  can  be  regarded  by  mental 
abstraction  from  the  two  distinct  standpoints  of  the  knowing 
mind  and  the  known  reality,  and  can  thus  give  rise  to  two 
distinct  sets  of  problems.  Epistemology  is  thus  concerned  with  j 
the  truth  and  certitude  of  human  knowledge  ;  with  the  subjective 
conditions  and  the  scope  and  limits  of  its  validity  ;  with  the  sub- 
jective or  mental  factors  involved  in  knowing.1  Ontology  is 
concerned  with  the  objects  of  knowledge,  with  reality  considered 
in  the  widest,  deepest,  and  most  fundamental  aspects  under  which 
it  is  conceived  by  the  human  mind  :  with  the  being  and  becoming 
of  reality,  its  possibility  and  its  actuality,  its  essence  and  its  exist- 
ence, its  unity  and  plurality  ;  with  the  aspects  of  truth,  goodness, 
perfection,  beauty,  which  it  assumes  in  relation  with  our  minds  ; 
with  the  contingency  of  finite  reality  and  the  grounds  and  implica- 
tions both  of  its  actual  existence  and  of  its  intelligibility ;  with 
the  modes  of  its  concrete  existence  and  behaviour,  the  supreme 
categories  of  reality  as  they  are  called:  substance,  individual 
nature,  and  personality ;  quantity,  space  and  time,  quality  and 
relation,  causality  and  purpose.  These  are  the  principal  topics 
investigated  in  the  present  volume.  The  investigation  is  con- 
fined to  fundamental  concepts  and  principles,  leaving  their  appli- 
cations to  be  followed  out  in  special  metaphysics.  Furthermore, 
the  theory  of  knowledge  known  as  Moderate  Realism?  the 
Realism  of  Aristotle  and  the  Scholastics,  in  regard  to  the  validity 
of  knowledge  both  sensual  and  intellectual,  is  assumed  through- 
out :  because  not  alone  is  this  the  true  theory,  but — as  a  natural 
consequence — it  is  the  only  theory  which  renders  the  individual 
things  and  events  of  human  experience  really  intelligible,  and 
at  the  same  time  keeps  the  highest  and  most  abstract  intellectual 
speculations  of  metaphysics  in  constant  and  wholesome  contact 
with  the  concrete,  actual  world  in  which  we  live,  move,  and  have 
our  being. 

VIII.  REMARKS  ON  SOME  MISGIVINGS  AND  PREJUDICES. — The 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §  17.        |        a  Cf.  ibid,  i.,  Introd.,  ch.  i. 


24  ONTOLOGY 

student,  especially  the  beginner,  will  find  the  investigations  in 
this  volume  rather  abstract ;  but  if  he  remembers  that  the  content 
of  our  intellectual  concepts,  be  they  ever  so  abstract  and  uni- 
versal, is  really  embodied  in  the  individual  things  and  events  of 
his  daily  experience,  he  will  not  be  disposed  to  denounce  all 
ultimate  analysis  of  these  concepts  as  "  unprofitable  "  or  "  un- 
real". He  will  recognize  that  the  reproach  of  "  talking  in  the 
air,"  which  was  levelled  by  an  eminent  medieval  scholastic1  at 
certain  philosophers  of  his  time,  tells  against  the  metaphysical 
speculations  of  Conceptualism,  but  not  against  those  of  Moderate 
Realism.  The  reproach  is  commonly  cast  at  all  systematic 
metaphysics  nowadays — from  prejudices  too  numerous  and  varied 
to  admit  of  investigation  here.2  The  modern  prejudice  which 
denies  the  very  possibility  of  metaphysics,  a  prejudice  arising 
from  Phenomenism,  Positivism,  and  Agnosticism — systems  which 
are  themselves  no  less  metaphysical  than  erroneous — will  be  ex- 
amined in  due  course.3 

But  really  in  order  to  dispel  all  such  misgivings  one  has 
only  to  remember  that  metaphysics,  systematic  or  otherwise,  is 
nothing  more  than  a  man's  reasoned  outlook  on  the  world  and 
life.  Whatever  his  conscious  opinions  and  convictions  may  be 
regarding  the  nature  and  purpose  of  himself,  and  other  men,  and 
the  world  at  large — and  if  he  use  his  reason  at  all  he  must  have 
some  sort  of  opinions  and  convictions,  whether  positive  or 
negative,  on  these  matters — those  opinions  and  convictions  are 
precisely  that  man's  metaphysics.  "  Breaking  free  for  the 
moment  from  all  historical  and  technical  definition,  let  us  affirm : 
To  get  at  reality — this  is  the  aim  of  metaphysics."  So  writes 
Professor  Ladd  in  the  opening  chapter  of  his  Theory  of  Reality.^ 
But  if  this  is  so,  surely  a  systematic  attempt  to  "  get  at  reality," 
no  matter  how  deep  and  wide,  no  matter  how  abstract  and 
universal  be  the  conceptions  and  speculations  to  which  it  leads 
us,  cannot  nevertheless  always  and  of  necessity  have  the  effect 
of  involving  us  in  a  mirage  of  illusion  and  unreality. 

Systematic  metaphysics— to  quote  again  the  author  just  referred  to— 
is  ...  the  necessary  result  of  a  patient,  orderly,  well-informed,  and  prolonged 

1  CAJETAN,  In  2  Post  Anal.,  ch.  xiii. 

2  Cf.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  §§  6-13  ;  LADD,  A  Theory  of  Reality,  ch.  i. 

3  infra,  ch.  viii.  ;  cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  Part  IV.,  ch.  iii.-vi. ;  Part  V.,  ch.  i. 

4  p.  18 — in  which  context  will  be  found  a  masterly  analysis  and  criticism  of 
current  prejudices  and  objections  against  systematic  metaphysics. 

5  ibid.  pp.  19-20. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  25 

study  of  those  ultimate  problems  which  are  proposed  to  every  reflective 
mind  by  the  real  existences  and  actual  transactions  of  selves  and  of  things. 
Thus  considered  it  appears  as  the  least  abstract  and  foreign  to  concrete 
realities  of  all  the  higher  pursuits  of  reason.  Mathematics  is  abstract ;  logic 
is  abstract ;  mathematical  and  so-called  "  pure "  physics  are  abstract. 
But  metaphysics  is  bound  by  its  very  nature  and  calling  always  to  keep  near 
to  the  actual  and  to  the  concrete.  Dive  into  the  depths  of  speculation  indeed 
it  may ;  and  its  ocean  is  boundless  in  expanse  and  deep  beyond  all  reach 
of  human  plummets.  But  it  finds  its  place  of  standing,  for  every  new  turn 
of  daring  explanation,  on  some  bit  of  solid  ground.  For  it  is  actuality 
which  it  wishes  to  understand — although  in  reflective  and  interpretative  way. 
To  quote  from  Professor  Royce  :  "  The  basis  of  our  whole  theory  is  the 
bare,  brute  fact  of  experience  which  you  have  always  with  you,  namely,  the 
fact :  Something  is  real.  Our  question  is :  What  is  this  reality  ?  or, 
again,  What  is  the  ultimately  real  ?  "  * 

The  wonderful  progress  of  the  positive  sciences  during  the 
last  few  centuries  has  been  the  occasion  of  prejudice  against 
metaphysics  in  a  variety  of  ways.  It  is  objected,  for  instance, 
that  metaphysics  has  no  corresponding  progress  to  boast  of;  and 
from  this  there  is  but  a  small  step  to  the  conclusion  that  all 
metaphysical  speculation  is,  sterile.  The  comparison  is  unfair  for 
many  reasons.  Research  into  the  ultimate  grounds  and  causes 
of  things  is  manifestly  more  difficult  than  research  into  their 
proximate  grounds  and  causes.  Again,  while  the  positive  sciences 
have  increased  our  knowledge  mainly  in  extent  rather  than  in 
depth,  it  is  metaphysics  and  only  metaphysics  that  can  increase 
this  knowledge  in  its  unity,  comprehensiveness,  and  significance. 

A  positive  increase  in  our  knowledge  of  the  manifold  data  of 
human  experience  is  not  the  aim  of  metaphysics ;  its  aim  is  to 
give  an  ultimate  meaning  and  interpretation  to  this  knowledge. 
It  is  not  utilitarian  in  the  narrower  sense  in  which  the  positive 
and  special  sciences  are  utilitarian  by  ministering  to  our  material 
needs  ;  but  in  the  higher  and  nobler  sense  of  pointing  out  to  us 
the  bearing  of  all  human  knowledge  and  achievement  on  our  real 
nature  and  destiny.  True,  indeed,  individual  leaders  and  schools 
of  metaphysics  have  strayed  from  the  truth  and  spoken  with  con- 
flicting and  uncertain  voices,  especially  when  they  have  failed  to 
avail  themselves  of  Truth  Divinely  Revealed.  This,  however,  is 
not  a  failure  of  metaphysics  but  of  individual  metaphysicians. 
And  furthermore,  it  is  undeniable  withal,  that  the  metaphysical 
labours  of  the  great  philosophers  in  all  ages  have  contributed 
richly  to  the  enlightenment  and  civilization  of  mankind — parti- 

1  ROYCE,  The  Conception  of  God,  p.  207. 


26  ONTOLOGY 

cularly  when  these  labours  have  been  in  concord  and  co-operation 
with  the  elevating  and  purifying  influences  of  the  Christian  religion. 
Of  no  metaphysical  system  is  this  so  entirely  true  as  of  that  em- 
bodied in  Scholastic  Philosophy.  The  greatest  intellect  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  St.  Thomas  Aquinas,  gave  to  this  philosophy  an 
expression  which  is  rightly  regarded  by  the  modern  scholastic 
as  his  intellectual  charter  and  the  most  worthy  starting-point 
of  his  philosophical  investigations.  The  following  passage  from 
an  eminent  representative  of  modern  scholastic  thought 1  is  suffi- 
ciently suggestive  to  admit  of  quotation  : — 

Amid  the  almost  uninterrupted  disintegration  of  systems  during  the 
1  ast  threecenturies,  the  philosophy  of  St.  Thomas  has  alone  been  able  to 
stand  the  shock  of  criticism  ;  it  alone  has  proved  sufficiently  solid  and  com- 
prehensive to  serve  as  an  intellectual  basis  and  unifying  principle  for  all  the 
new  facts  and  phenomena  brought  to  light  by  the  modern  sciences.  And 
unless  we  are  much  mistaken,  those  who  take  up  and  follow  this  philosophy 
will  come  to  think,  as  we  do,  that  on  the  analysis  of  mental  acts  and  processes, 
on  the  inner  nature  of  corporeal  things,  of  living  things,  and  of  man,  on  the 
existence  and  nature  of  God,  on  the  foundations  of  speculative  and  moral 
science,  none  have  thought  or  written  more  wisely  than  St.  Thomas  Aquinas. 
But  though  we  place  our  programme  and  teaching  under  the  patronage  of 
the  illustrious  name  of  this  prince  of  scholastics,  we  do  not  regard  the 
Thomistic  philosophy  as  an  ideal  beyond  possibility  of  amelioration,  or  as  a 
boundary  to  the  activity  of  the  human  mind.  We  do  think,  however,  on 
mature  reflection,  that  we  are  acting  no  less  wisely  than  modestly  in  taking  it 
as  our  starting-point  and  constant  standard  of  reference.  This  we  say  in 
answer  to  those  of  our  friends  and  enemies  who  are  occasionally  pleased  to 
ask  us  if  we  really  do  mean  to  lead  back  the  modern  mind  into  the  Middle 
Ages,  and  to  identify  philosophy  simply  with  the  thought  of  any  one  phil- 
osopher. Manifestly,  we  mean  nothing  of  the  kind.  Has  not  Leo  XIII.,  the 
great  initiator  of  the  new  scholastic  movement,  expressly  warned  us  2  to  be 
mindful  of  the  present :  "  Edicimus  libenti  gratoque  animo  recipiendum  esse 
quidquid  sapienter  dictum,  quidquid  utiliter  fuerit  a  quopiam  inventum  atque 
excogitatum ' '  ? 

St.  Thomas  himself  would  be  the  first  to  rebuke  those  who  would  follow 
his  own  philosophical  opinions  in  all  things  against  their  own  better  judgment, 
and  to  remind  them  of  what  he  wrote  at  the  head  of  his  Summa  :  that  in 
philosophy,  of  all  arguments  that  based  on  human  authority  is  the  weakest, 
"  locus  ab  auctoritate  quae  fundatur  super  ratione  humana,  est  infirmissimus  ".3 

Again,  therefore,  let  us  assert  that  respect  for  tradition  is  not  servility  but 
mere  elementary  prudence.  Respect  for  a  doctrine  of  whose  soundness  and 
worth  we  are  personally  convinced  is  not  fetishism  ;  it  is  but  a  rational  and 
rightful  tribute  to  the  dominion  of  Truth  over  Mind. 

1  MERCIER,  Logique,  Introd.,  §  14. 

2  Encyclical,  Aeterni  Patris,  on  philosophical  studies. 

3  Summa  Theologica,  i,  q.  i,  a.  8,  ad.  2. 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  27 

Modern  scholastics  will  know  how  to  take  to  heart  and  profit  by  the 
lessons  of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  century  controversies  ;  they  will 
avoid  the  mistakes  of  their  predecessors  ;  they  will  keep  in  close  contact  with 
the  special  sciences  subsidiary  to  philosophy  and  with  the  views  and  teachings 
of  modern  and  contemporary  thinkers.1 

An  overweening  confidence  in  the  power  of  the  special  sciences 
to  solve  ultimate  questions,  or  at  least  to  tell  us  all  that  can  be 
known  for  certain  about  these  problems,  a  confidence  based  on 
the  astonishing  progress  of  those  sciences  in  modern  times,  is  the 
source  of  yet  another  prejudice  against  metaphysics.  It  is  a 
prejudice  of  the  half-educated  mind,  of  the  camp-followers  of 
science,  not  of  its  leaders.  These  latter  are  keenly  conscious 
that  the  solution  of  ultimate  questions  lies  entirely  beyond  the 
methods  of  the  special  sciences.  Not  that  even  the  most  eminent 
scientists  do  not  indulge  in  speculations  about  ultimate  problems 
— as  they  have  a  perfect  right  to  do.  But  though  they  may  be 
themselves  quite  aware  that  such  speculations  are  distinctly 
metaphysical,  there  are  multitudes  who  seem  to  think  that  a 
theory  ceases  to  be  metaphysical  and  becomes  scientific  provided 
only  it  is  broached  by  a  scientific  expert  as  distinct  from  a  meta- 
physician.2 But  all  sincere  thinkers  will  recognize  that  no  ulti- 
mate question  about  the  totality  of  human  experience  can  be 
solved  by  any  science  which  explores  merely  a  portion  of  this 
experience.  Nay,  the  more  rapid  and  extensive  is  the  progress  of 
the  various  special  sciences,  the  more  imperative  and  insistent 
becomes  the  need  to  collect  and  collate  their  separate  findings,  to 
interrogate  them  one  and  all  as  to  whether  and  how  far  these 
findings  fit  in  with  the  facts  and  conditions  of  human  life  and 
existence,  to  determine  what  light  and  aid  they  contribute  to  the 
solution  of  the  great  and  ever  recurring  questions  of  the  whence  ? 
and  whither  ?  and  why  ?  of  man  and  the  universe.  One  who  is 
a  sincere  scientist  as  well  as  an  earnest  philosopher  has  written 
a  propos  of  this  necessity  in  the  following  terms  : — 

The  farther  science  has  pushed  back  the  limits  of  the  discernible  uni- 
verse, the  more  insistently  do  we  feel  the  demand  within  us  for  some  satis- 
factory explanation  of  the  whole.  The  old,  eternal  problems  rise  up  before 
us  and  clamour  loudly  and  ever  more  loudly  for  some  newer  and  better 
solution.  The  solution  offered  by  a  bygone  age  was  soothing  at  least,  if  it 
was  not  final.  In  the  present  age,  however,  the  problems  reappear  with 

1  C/.  MERCIER,  Origines  de  la  psychologic  contemporaine,  ch.  viii.  ;  DE  WULF, 
Scholasticism  Old  and  New  (passim). 

2  C/.  LADD,  op.  cit.,  pp.  9,  10. 


28  ONTOLOGY 

an  acuteness  that  is  almost  painful :  the  deep  secret  of  our  own  human 
nature,  the  questions  of  our  origin  and  destiny,  the  intermeddling  of 
blind  necessity  and  chance  and  pain  in  the  strange,  tangled  drama  of  our 
existence,  the  foibles  and  oddities  of  the  human  soul,  and  all  the  mystifying 
problems  of  social  relations  :  are  not  these  all  so  many  enigmas  which  torment 
and  trouble  us  whithersoever  we  turn  ?  And  all  seem  to  circle  around  the 
one  essential  question  :  Has  human  nature  a  real  meaning  and  value,  or  is  it 
so  utterly  amiss  that  truth  and  peace  will  never  be  its  portion  ? l 

A  final  difficulty  against  philosophical  research  is  suggested 
by  the  thought  that  if  the  philospher  has  to  take  cognizance  of 
all  the  conclusions  of  all  the  special  sciences  his  task  is  an  im- 
possible one,  inasmuch  as  nowadays  at  all  events  it  would  take 
a  lifetime  to  become  proficient  in  a  few  of  these  sciences  not  to 
speak  of  all  of  them. 

There  is  no  question,  however,  of  becoming  proficient  in  them  ; 
the  philosopher  need  not  be  a  specialist  in  any  positive  science ; 
his  acquaintance  with  the  contents  of  these  sciences  need  extend 
no  farther  than  such  established  conclusions  and  such  current 
though  unverified  hypotheses  as  have  an  immediate  bearing  on 
ultimate  or  philosophical  problems. 

Moreover,  while  it  would  be  injurious  both  to  philosophy  and 
to  science,  as  is  proved  by  the  history  of  both  alike,  to  separate 
synthetic  from  analytic  speculation  by  a  divorce  between  philo- 
sophy and  science ;  while  it  would  be  unwise  to  ignore  the  con- 
clusions of  the  special  sciences  and  to  base  philosophical  research 
exclusively  on  the  data  of  the  plain  man's  common  and  unanalysed 
experience,  it  must  be  remembered  on  the  other  hand  that  the 
most  fundamental  truths  of  speculative  and  practical  philosophy, 
the  truths  that  are  most  important  for  the  right  and  proper 
orientation  of  human  life,  can  be  established  and  defended  inde- 
pendently of  the  special  researches  of  the  positive  sciences.  The 
human  mind  had  not  to  await  the  discovery  of  radium  in  order 
to  prove  the  existence  of  God.  Such  supreme  truths  as  the  ex- 
istence of  God,  the  immortality  of  the  human  soul,  the  freedom  of 
the  human  will,  the  existence  of  a  moral  law,  the  distinction  be- 
tween right  and  wrong,  etc.,  have  been  always  in  possession  of 
the  human  race.  It  has  been,  moreover,  confirmed  in  its  posses- 
sion of  them  by  Divine  Revelation.  And  it  has  not  needed 
either  the  rise  or  the  progress  of  modern  science  to  defend  them. 
These  fundamental  rational  truths  constitute  ^philosophiaperennis : 

1  EUCKEN,  Gesammelte  Aufsaetze  zur  Philosophic  und  Lebensanschauung,  §  157 
(Leipzig,  1903). 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  29 

a  fund  of  truth  which  is,  like  all  truth,  immutable,  though  our 
human  insight  into  it  may  develop  in  depth  and  clearness. 

But  while  this  is  so  it  is  none  the  less  true  that  philosophy, 
to  be  progressive  in  its  own  order,  must  take  account  of  every 
new  fact  and  conclusion  brought  to  light  in  every  department  of 
scientific — and  historical,  and  artistic,  and  literary,  and  every 
other  sort  of — research.  And  this  for  the  simple  reason  that  every 
such  accession,  whether  of  fact  or  of  theory,  is  an  enlargement 
of  human  experience ;  as  such  it  clamours  on  the  one  hand  for 
philosophical  interpretation,  for  explanation  in  the  light  of  what 
we  know  already  about  the  ultimate  grounds  and  causes  of  things, 
for  admission  into  our  world-outlook,  for  adjustment  and  co-or- 
dination with  the  previous  contents  of  the  latter ;  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  by  its  very  appearance  on  the  horizon  of  human  ex- 
perience it  may  enrich  or  illumine,  rectify  or  otherwise  influence, 
this  outlook  or  some  aspect  of  it.1 

If,  then,  philosophy  has  to  take  account  of  advances  in  every 
other  department  of  human  research,  it  is  clear  that  its  mastery 
at  the  present  day  is  a  more  laborious  task  than  ever  it  was  in 
the  past.  In  order  to  get  an  intelligent  grasp  of  its  principles  in 
their  applications  to  the  problems  raised  by  the  progress  of  the 
sciences,  to  newly  discovered  facts  and  newly  propounded  hypo- 
theses, the  student  must  be  familiar  with  these  facts  and  hypo- 
theses ;  and  all  the  more  so  because  through  the  medium  of  a 
sensational  newspaper  press  that  has  more  regard  for  novelty 
than  truth,  these  facts  and  hypotheses  are  no  sooner  brought  to 
light  by  scientists  than  what  are  often  garbled  and  distorted 
versions  of  them  are  circulated  among  the  masses.2 

Similarly,  in  order  that  a  sound  system  of  speculative  and 

1  Cf.  art.  Philosophy  and  the  Sciences  at  Louvain,  in  the  Irish  \Ecclesiastical 
Record,  May,  1905,  reprinted  as  Appendix  in  DE  WULF'S  Scholasticism  Old  and 
New. 

2  Hence  the  necessity  of  equipping  the  student  of  philosophy  with  a  knowledge 
of  the  main  conclusions  and  theories  of  the  sciences  that  have  an  immediate  bearing 
on  philosophy :  chemistry,  physics,  geology,  astronomy,  mechanics,  the  axioms  and 
postulates   of  pure   and   applied  mathematics,   cellular   biology,  embryology,   the 
physiology  of  the  nervous  system,  botany  and  zoology,  political  economy,  sociology 
and  ethnology.     Nowhere  is  the  system  of  combining  the  scientific  with  the  philoso- 
phical formation  of  mind  more  thoroughly  carried  out  at  the  present  time  than  in 
the  curriculum  of  the  Philosophical  Institute  at  the  University  of  Louvain.     In  the 
College  of  Maynooth  not  only  is  the  study  of  philosophy  completed  by  a  fuller 
course  of  Christian  Theology, — both  disciplines  thus  combining  to  give  the  student 
all  the  essential  elements  of  a  complete  Philosophy  of  Life  (ii.), — but  it  is  preceded  by 
an  elementary  training  in  the  physical  sciences  and  accompanied  by  courses  on  the 
history  of  scientific  theories  in  chemistry,  physics,  physiology,  and  general  biology. 


3o  ONTOLOGY 

practical  philosophy  be  expounded,  developed,  and  defended  at 
the  present  time,  a  system  that  will  embrace  and  co-ordinate  the 
achieved  results  of  modern  scientific  research,  a  system  that  will 
offer  the  most  satisfactory  solutions  of  old  difficulties  in  new 
forms  and  give  the  most  reasonable  and  reliable  answers  to  the 
ever  recurring  questionings  of  man  concerning  his  own  nature 
and  destiny — it  is  clear  that  the  insufficiency  of  individual  effort 
must  be  supplemented  by  the  co-operation  of  numbers.  It  is 
the  absence  of  fulness,  completeness,  adequacy,  in  most  modern 
systems  of  philosophy,  their  fragmentary  character,  the  unequal 
development  of  their  parts,  that  accounts  very  largely  for  the 
despairing  attitude  of  the  many  who  nowadays  despise  and  turn 
away  from  philosophical  speculation.  Add  to  this  the  uncertain 
voice  with  which  these  philosophies  speak  in  consequence  of 
their  advocates  ignoring  the  implications  of  the  most  stupendous 
fact  in  human  experience, — the  Christian  Revelation.  But  there 
is  one  philosophy  which  is  free  from  these  defects,  a  philosophy 
which  is  in  complete  harmony  with  Revealed  Truth,  and  which 
forms  with  the  latter  the  only  true  Philosophy  of  Life  ;  and  that 
one  philosophy  is  the  system  which,  assimilating  the  wisdom  of 
Plato,  Aristotle  and  all  the  other  greatest  thinkers  of  the  world, 
has  been  traditionally  expounded  in  the  Christian  schools— 
the  Scholastic  system  of  philosophy.  It  has  been  elaborated 
by  no  one  man,  and  is  the  original  fruit  of  no  one  mind.  Un- 
like the  philosophies  of  Kant  or  Hegel  or  Spencer  or  James  or 
Comte  or  Bergson,  it  is  not  a  "  one-man  "  philosophy.  It  cannot 
boast  of  the  novelty  or  originality  of  the  many  eccentric  and 
ephemeral  "systems"  which  have  succeeded  one  another  so 
rapidly  in  recent  times  in  the  world  of  intellectual  fashion ;  but 
it  has  ever  possessed  the  enduring  novelty  of  the  truth,  which  is 
ever  ancient  and  ever  new.  Now  although  this  philosophy  may 
have  been  mastered  in  its  broad  outlines  and  applications  by 
specially  gifted  individuals  in  past  ages,  its  progressive  exposi- 
tion and  development,  and  its  application  to  the  vastly  extended 
and  ever-growing  domains  of  experience  that  are  being  con- 
stantly explored  by  the  special  sciences,  can  never  be  the  work  of 
any  individual :  it  can  be  accomplished  only  by  the  earnest 
co-operation  of  Christian  philosophers  in  every  part  of  the 
civilized  world.1 

1 "  We  may  mention  it  in  passing,"  writes  Mercier  in  his  general  introduction 
to  philosophy  (Logique,  §  i,  p.  6)— "  it  was  this  feeling  of  individual  impotence  in 


GENERAL  INTRODUCTION  31 

In  carrying  on  this  work  we  have  not  to  build  from  the 
beginning.  "  It  has  sometimes  been  remarked,"  as  Newman 
observes,1  "  when  men  have  boasted  of  the  knowledge  of  modern 
times,  that  no  wonder  we  see  more  than  the  ancients  because  we 
are  mounted  upon  their  shoulders."  Yes  ;  the  intellectual  toilers 
of  to-day  are  heirs  to  the  intellectual  wealth  of  their  ancestors. 
We  have  tradition :  not  to  despise  but  to  use,  critically, 
judiciously,  reverently,  if  we  are  to  use  it  profitably.  Thomas 
Davis  has  somewhere  said  that  they  who  demolish  the  past  do 
not  build  up  for  the  future.  And  we  have  the  Christian  Revela- 
tion, as  a  lamp  to  our  feet  and  a  light  to  our  paths 2  in  all  those 
rational  investigations  which  form  the  appointed  task  of  the 
philosopher.  Hence, 

Let  knowledge  grow  from  more  to  more, 

But  more  of  reverence  in  us  dwell ; 

That  mind  and  soul,  according  well, 
May  make  one  music  as  before, 
But  vaster.3 

face  of  the  task  confronting  the  philosopher  at  the  present  day,  that  inspired  the 
foundation  of  the  Philosophical  Institute  at  the  University  of  Louvain  ".  He  had 
previously  outlined  the  project  in  his  Rapport  sur  les  etudes  philosophiques  at  the 
Congress  of  Mechlin  in  1891.  Here  are  a  few  brief  extracts  from  that  memorable 
document :  "  Since  individual  effort  feels  itself  well  nigh  powerless  in  the  presence 
of  the  field  of  observation  which  goes  on  widening  day  by  day,  association  must 
make  up  for  the  insufficiency  of  the  isolated  worker  ;  men  of  analysis  and  men  of 
synthesis  must  come  together  and  form,  by  their  daily  intercourse  and  united  action, 
an  atmosphere  suited  to  the  harmonious  development  of  science  and  philosophy  alike." 
.  .  .  "  Man  has  multiplied  his  power  of  vision  ;  he  enters  the  world  of  the  infinitely 
small ;  he  fixes  his  scrutinizing  gaze  upon  regions  where  our  most  powerful 
telescopes  discern  no  limits.  Physics  and  Chemistry  progress  with  giant  Istrides  in 
the  study  of  the  properties  of  matter  and  of  the  combinations  of  its  elements. 
Geology  and  Astronomy  reconstruct  the  history  of  the  origin  and  formation  of  our 
planet.  Biology  and  the  natural  sciences  study  the  minute  structure  of  living 
organisms,  their  distribution  in  space  and  succession  in  time ;  and  Embryology  ex- 
plores their  origin.  The  archaeological,  philological  and  social  sciences  reconstruct 
the  past  ages  of  our  history  and  civilizations.  What  an  inexhaustible  mine  is  here 
to  exploit,  what  regions  to  explore  and  materials  to  analyse  and  interpret ;  finally 
what  pioneers  we  must  engage  in  the  work  if  we  are  to  have  a  share  in  garnering 
those  treasures !  " 

1  Grammar  of  Assent,  p.  229. 

2  Lucerna  pedibus  meis  verbum  tuum,  et  lumen  semitis  meis. — Ps.  cxviii.,  105. 
8  TENNYSON,  In  Memoriam. 


CHAPTER  I. 

BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS. 

i.  OUR  CONCEPT  OF  BEING  :  ITS  EXPRESSION  AND  FEATURES. 
— The  term  "Being"  (Lat.  ens ;  Gr.  &v ;  Ger.  Seiend ;  Fr.  front) 
as  present  participle  of  the  verb  to  be  (Lat.  esse ;  Gr.  iwai ; 
Ger.  Sein  ;  Fr.  etre)  means  existing  (existensy  existere).  But  the 
participle  has  come  to  be  used  as  a  noun  ;  and  as  such  it  does 
riot  necessarily  imply  actual  existence  hie  et  nunc.  It  does  in- 
deed imply  some  relation  to  actual  existence ;  for  we  designate 
as  "  being  "  (in  the  substantive  sense)  only  whatever  we  conceive 
as  actually  existing  or  at  least  as  capable  of  existing  ;  and  it  is 
from  the  participial  sense,  which  implies  actual  existence,  that 
the  substantive  sense  has  been  derived.  Moreover,  the  intelligible 
use  of  the  word  " being"  as  a  term  implies  a  reference  to  some 
actually  existing  sphere  of  reality.1  It  is  in  the  substantive 
meaning  the  term  will  be  most  frequently  used  in  these  pages,  as 
the  context  will  show.  When  we  speak  of  "a  being"  in  the 
concrete,  the  word  has  the  same  meaning  as  "  thing  "  (res)  used 
in  the  wide  sense  in  which  this  latter  includes  persons,  places, 
events,  facts  and  phenomena  of  whatsoever  kind.  In  the  same 
sense  we  speak  of  "  a  reality,"  this  term  having  taken  on  a  con- 
crete, in  addition  to  its  original  abstract,  meaning.  "  Being  "  has 
also  this  abstract  sense  when  we  speak  of  "  the  being  or  reality 
of  things ".  Finally  it  may  be  used  in  a  collective  sense  to 
indicate  the  sum-total  of  all  that  is  or  can  be — all  reality. 

(a)  The   notion   of   being,    spontaneously   reached    by   the 
human  mind,   is  found  on  reflection  to  be  the  simplest  of  all 
notions,  defying  every  attempt  at  analysis  into  simpler  notions. 
It  is  involved   in  every  other  concept  which  we  form  of  any 
object  of  thought  whatsoever.     Without  it  we  could  have  no 
concept  of  anything. 

(b)  It  is  thus  \hefirst  of  all  notions  in  the  logical  order \  i.e. 
in  the  process  of  rational  thought. 

1 C/.  Logic,  i.,  §  123. 
32 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS 


33 


(c)  It  is  also  thejirst  of  all  notions  in  the  chronological  order, 
the  first   which  the  human  mind  forms  in   the  order  of  time. 
Not,  of  course,  that  we  remember  having  formed  it  before  any 
other  more   determinate    notions.      But  the   child's   awakening 
intellectual    activity    must   have  proceeded    from    the   simplest, 
easiest,  most  superficial  of  all  concepts,  to  fuller,  clearer,  and  more 
determinate  concepts,  i.e.  from  the  vague  and  confused  notion  of 
"  being  "  or  "  thing  "  to  notions  of  definite  modes  of  being,  or 
kinds  of  thing. 

(d)  This  direct  notion  of  being  is  likewise  the  most  indeter- 
minate of  all  notions  ;  though  not  of  course  entirely  indeterminate. 
An  object  of  thought,  to  be  conceivable  or  intelligible  at  all  by 
our  finite  minds,  must  be  rendered  definite  in  some  manner  and 
degree ;  and  even  this  widest  notion  of  "  being "  is  rendered 
intelligible  only  by  being  conceived  as  positive  and  as  contrasting 
with  absolute  non-being  or  nothingness.1 

According  to  the  Hegelian  philosophy  "  pure  thought "  can  apparently 
think  "  pure  being,"  i.e.  being  in  absolute  indeterminateness,  being  as  not 
even  differentiated  from  "pure  not-being"  or  absolute  nothingness.  And 
this  absolutely  indeterminate  confusion  (we  may  not  call  it  a  "  synthesis  "  or 
"  unity  ")  of  something  and  nothing,  of  being  and  not-being,  of  positive  and 
negative,  of  affirmation  and  denial,  would  be  conceived  by  our  finite  minds 
as  the  objective  correlative  of,  and  at  the  same  time  as  absolutely  identical 
with,  its  subjective  correlative  which  is  "  pure  thought ".  Well,  it  is  with  the 
human  mind  and  its  objects,  and  how  it  thinks  those  objects,  that  we  are 
concerned  at  present ;  not  with  speculations  involving  the  gratuitous  assump- 
tion of  a  Being  that  would  transcend  all  duality  of  subject  and  object,  all 
determinateness  of  knowing  and  being,  all  distinction  of  thought  and  thing. 
We  believe  that  the  human  mind  can  establish  the  existence  of  a  Supreme 
Being  whose  mode  of  Thought  and  Existence  transcends  all  human  com- 
prehension, but  it  can  do  so  only  as  the  culminating  achievement  of  all  its 
speculation  ;  and  the  transcendent  Being  it  thus  reaches  has  nothing  in 
common  with  the  monistic  ideal-real  being  of  Hegel's  philosophy.  In  en- 
deavouring to  set  out  from  the  high  a  priori  ground  of  such  an  intangible 
conception,  the  Hegelian  philosophy  starts  at  the  wrong  end. 

(e)  Further,  the  notion  of  being  is  the  most  abstract  of  all 
notions,  poorest  in  intension  as  it  is  widest  in  extension.      We 
derive  it  from  the  data  of  our  experience,  and  the  process  by  which 
we  reach  it  is  a  process  of  abstraction.     We  lay  aside  all  the 
differences  whereby  things  are  distinguished  from  one  another ; 
we  do  not  consider  these  differences  ;  we  prescind  or  abstract 
from  them  mentally,  and  retain  for  consideration  only  what  is 

1  C/.  Logic,  i.,  pp.  204-6. 

3 


34  ONTOLOGY 

common  to  all  of  them.  This  common  element  forms  the  ex- 
plicit content  of  our  notion  of  being. 

It  must  be  noted,  however,  that  we  do  not  positively  exclude 
the  differences  from  the  object  of  our  concept ;  we  cannot  do  this, 
for  the  simple  reason  that  the  differences  too  are  "being,"  inas- 
much as  they  too  are  modes  of  being.  Our  attitude  towards 
them  is  negative ;  we  merely  abstain  from  considering  them 
explicitly,  though  they  remain  in  our  concept  implicitly.  The 
separation  effected  is  only  mental,  subjective,  notional,  formal, 
negative ;  not  objective,  not  real,  not  positive.  Hence  the  pro- 
cess by  which  we  narrow  down  the  concept  of  being  to  the  more 
comprehensive  concept  of  this  or  that  generic  or  specific  mode  of 
being,  does  not  add  to  the  former  concept  anything  really  new, 
or  distinct  from,  or  extraneous  to  it  •  but  rather  brings  out  ex- 
plicitly something  that  was  implicit  in  the  latter.  The  composi- 
tion of  being  with  its  modes  is,  therefore,  only  logical  composition, 
not  real. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  would  seem  that  when  we  abstract  a 
generic  mode  of  being  from  the  specific  modes  subordinate  to 
the  former,  vtt  positively  exclude  the  differentiating  characteristics 
of  these  species  ;  and  that,  conversely,  when  we  narrow  down  the 
genus  to  a  subordinate  species  we  do  so  by  adding  on  a  differenti- 
ating mode  which  was  not  contained  even  implicitly  in  the  generic 
concept.  Thus,  for  example,  the  differentiating  concept "  rational " 
is  not  contained  even  implicitly  in  the  generic  concept  "  animal "  : 
it  is  added  on  ab  extra  to  the  latter  *  in  order  to  reach  the  specific 
concept  of  "  rational  animal  "  or  "  man  "  ;  so  that  in  abstracting 
the  generic  from  the  subordinate  specific  concept  we  prescind 
objectively  and  really  from  the  differentiating  concept,  by  positively 
excluding  this  latter.  This  kind  of  abstraction  is  called  objective, 
real,  positive  ;  and  the  composition  of  such  generic  and  differen- 
tiating modes  of  being  is  technically  known  as  metaphysical  com- 
position. The  different  modes  of  being,  which  the  mind  can 
distinguish  at  different  levels  of  abstraction  in  any  specific  con- 
cept— such  as  "  rational,"  "  sentient,"  "  living,"  "  corporeal,"  in  the 
concept  of"  man  " — are  likewise  known  as  "  metaphysical  grades  " 
of  being. 

It  has  been  questioned  whether  this  latter  kind  of  abstraction  is  always 
used  in  relating  generic,  specific,  and  differential  modes  of  being.  At  first 

1  C/.  SCOTUS,  Summa  Theologica,  edit,  by  Montefortino  (Rome,  1900),  i.,  p.  106, 
Ad  tertium, 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         35 

sight  it  would  not  appear  to  be  a  quite  satisfactory  account  of  the  process  in 
cases  where  the  generic  notion  exhibits  a  mode  of  being  which  can  be  em- 
bodied only  in  one  or  other  of  a  number  of  alternative  specific  modes  by 
means  of  differentiae  not  found  in  any  things  lying  outside  the  genus  itself. 
The  generic  notion  of  "  plane  rectilinear  figure  "  does  not,  of  course,  include 
explicitly  its  species  "  triangle,"  "quadrilateral,"  "  pentagon,"  etc. ;  nor  does 
it  include  even  implicitly  any  definite  one  of  them.  But  the  concept  of  each 
of  the  differentiating  characters,  e.g.  the  differentia  "  three-sidedness,"  is 
unintelligible  except  as  a  mode  of  a  "  plane  rectilinear  figure  ",1  This,  how- 
ever, is  only  accidental,  i.e.  due  to  the  special  objects  considered  ; 2  and  even 
here  there  persists  this  difference  that  whereas  what  differentiates  the  species 
of  plane  rectilinear  figures  is  not  explicitly  and  formally  plane-rectilinearity, 
that  which  differentiates  finite  from  infinite  being,  or  substantial  from  accidental 
being,  is  itself  also  formally  and  explicitly  being.  But  there  are  other  cases 
in  which  the  abstraction  is  manifestly  objective.  Thus,  for  example,  the 
differentiating  concept  "  rational  "  does  not  even  implicitly  include  the  generic 
concept  "  animal,"  for  the  former  concept  may  be  found  realized  in  beings 
other  than  animals  ;  and  the  differentiating  concept  "  living  "  does  not  even 
implicitly  include  the  concept  "  corporeal,"  for  it  may  be  found  realized  in 
incorporeal  beings. 

(/)  Since  the  notion  of  being  is  so  simple  that  it  cannot  be 
analysed  into  simpler  notions  which  might  serve  as  its  genus  and 
differentia,  it  cannot  strictly  speaking  be  defined.  We  can  only 
describe  it  by  considering  it  from  various  points  of  view  and 
comparing  it  with  the  Various  modes  in  which  we  find  it  realized. 
This  is  what  we  have  been  attempting  so  far.  Considering  its 
fundamental  relation  to  existence  we  might  say  that  "  Being  is 
that  which  exists  or  is  at  least  capable  of  existing  "  :  Ens  est  id 
quod  existit  vel  saltern  existere  potest.  Or,  considering  its  relation 
to  its  opposite  we  might  say  that  "  Being  is  that  which  is  not 
absolute  nothingness  "  :  Ens  est  id  quod  non  est  nihil  absolutum. 
Or,  considering  its  relation  to  our  minds,  we  might  say  that  "  Being 
is  whatever  is  thinkable,  whatever  can  be  an  object  of  thought ". 

(g]  The  notion  of  being  is  so  universal  that  it  transcends  all 
actual  and  conceivable  determinate  modes  of  being :  it  embraces 
infinite  being  and  all  modes  of  finite  being.  In  other  words  it 
is  not  itself  a  generic,  but  a  transcendental  notion.  Wider  than 
all,  even  the  widest  and  highest  genera,  it  is  not  itself  a  genus. 
A  genus  is  determinable  into  its  species  by  the  addition  of  differ- 
ences which  lie  outside  the  concept  of  the  genus  itself;  being, 

1  C/.  Logic,  i.,  pp.  119-20. 

2  C/.  SCOTUS,  op.  cit.,  i.,  pp.  104, 129 ;  also  URRABURU,  Ontologia,  Disp.  III.,  Cap. 
HI.,  Art.  III.,  p.  155. 


36  ONTOLOGY 

as  we  have  seen,  is  not  in  this  way  determinable  into  its 
modes. 

2.  IN  WHAT  SENSE  ARE  ALL  THINGS  THAT  EXIST  OR  CAN  EX- 
IST SAID  TO  BE  "  REAL  "  OR  TO  HAVE  "  BEING  "  ? — A  generic  con- 
cept can  be  predicated  univocally,  i.e.  in  the  same  sense,  of  its 
subordinate  species.  These  latter  differ  from  one  another  by  char- 
acteristics which  lie  outside  the  concept  of  the  genus,  while  they  all 
agree  in  realizing  the  generic  concept  itself:  they  do  not  of  course 
realize  it  in  the  same  way,1  but  as  such  it  is  really  and  truly  in 
each  of  them  and  is  predicated  in  the  same  sense  of  each.  But 
the  characteristics  which  differentiate  all  genera  and  species  from 
one  another,  and  from  the  common  notion  of  being,  in  which 
they  all  agree,  are  likewise  being.  That  in  which  they  differ 
is  being,  as  well  as  that  in  which  they  agree.  Hence  we  do  not 
predicate  "being"  univocally  of  its  various  modes.  When  we 
say  of  the  various  classes  of  things  which  make  up  our 
experience  that  they  are  "real"  (or  "  realities,"  or  "beings"), 
we  do  not  apply  this  predicate  in  altogether  the  same  sense 
to  the  several  classes;  for  as  applied  to  each  class  it  con- 
notes the  whole  content  of  each,  not  merely  the  part  in  which 
this  agrees  with,  but  also  the  part  in  which  it  differs  from,  the 
others.  Nor  yet  do  we  apply  the  concept  of  "  being  "  in  a  totally 
different  sense  to  each  separate  determinate  mode  of  being. 
When  we  predicate  "  being  "  of  its  modes  the  predication  is  not 
merely  equivocal.  The  concept  expressed  by  the  predicate-term 
"  being  "  is  not  totally  different  as  applied  to  each  subject-mode  ; 
for  in  all  cases  alike  it  implies  either  actual  existence  or  some  re- 
lation thereto.  It  only  remains,  therefore,  that  we  must  regard 
the  notion  of  being,  when  predicated  of  its  several  modes,  as 
partly  the  same  and  partly  different ;  and  this  is  what  we  mean 
when  we  say  that  the  concept  of  being  is  analogical^  that  being  is 
predicated  analogically  of  its  various  modes. 

Analogical  predication  is  of  two  kinds  :  a  term  or  concept 
may  be  affirmed  of  a  variety  of  subjects  either  by  analogy  of  at- 
tribution or  by  analogy  of  proportion.  We  may,  for  instance,  speak 
not  only  ot  a  man  as  "  healthy,"  but  also  of  his  food,  his  counten- 

1  Hence  St.  Thomas  calls  the  things  about  which  a  generic  or  specific  concept 
is  predicated  "  analoga  secundum  esse  etnon  secundum  intentionem"  (In  i  Sent., 
Dist.  xix.,  q.  5,  a.  2,  ad  i  am) :  we  bring  them  under  the  same  notion  or  "  intentio  " 
(e.g.  "  living  being  "),  but  the  content  of  this  notion  is  realized  in  the  various  things 
(e.g.  in  Socrates,  this  horse,  that  rose-tree,  etc.)  in  varying  and  unequal  degrees  of 
perfection.  Hence,  too,  this  univocal  relation  of  the  genus  to  its  subordinate  sub- 
jects is  sometimes  (improperly)  called  "analogy  of  inequality  ". 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         37 

ance,  his  occupation,  his  companionship,  etc.,  as  "healthy". 
Now  health  is  found  really  only  in  the  man,  but  it  is  attributed 
to  the  other  things  owing  to  some  extrinsic  but  real  connexion 
which  they  have  with  his  health,  whether  as  cause,  or  effect,  or 
indication,  of  the  latter.  This  is  analogy  of  attribution  ;  the 
subject  of  which  the  predicate  is  properly  and  primarily  affirmed 
being  known  as  the  primary  analogue  or  analogum  princeps> 
those  to  which  it  is  transferred  being  called  the  analogata.  It 
underlies  the  figures  of  speech  known  as  metynomy  and  synech- 
doche.  Now  on  account  of  the  various  relations  that  exist  be- 
tween the  different  modes  of  being,  relations  of  cause  and  effect, 
whole  and  part,  means  and  end,  ground  and  consequence,  etc. — 
relations  which  constitute  the  orders  of  existing  and  possible 
things,  the  physical  and  the  metaphysical  orders — being  is  of  course 
predicated  of  its  modes  by  analogy  of  attribution ;  and  in  such 
predication  infinite  being  is  the  primary  analogue  for  finite  beings, 
and  the  substance-mode  of  being  for  all  accident-modes  of  being. 
Inasmuch,  however,  as  being  is  not  merely  attributed  to  these 
modes  extrinsically,  but  belongs  to  all  of  them  intrinsically,  it  is 
also  predicated  of  them  by  analogy  of  proportion.  This  latter 
sort  of  analogy  is  based  on  similarity  of  relations.  For  example, 
the  act  of  understanding  bears  a  relation  to  the  mind  similar  to 
that  which  the  act  of  seeing  bears  to  the  eye,  and  hence  we  say 
of  the  mind  that  it  "  sees  "  things  when  it  understands  them.  Or, 
again,  we  speak  of  a  verdant  valley  in  the  sunshine  as  "smiling," 
because  its  appearance  bears  a  relation  to  the  valley  similar  to 
that  which  a  smile  bears  to  the  human  countenance.  Or  again, 
we  speak  of  the  parched  earth  as  "  thirsting "  for  the  rains,  or  of 
the  devout  soul  as  "  thirsting  "  for  God,  because  these  relations 
are  recognized  as  similar  to  that  of  a  thirsty  person  towards  the 
drink  for  which  he  thirsts.  In  all  such  cases  the  analogical  con- 
cept implies  not  indeed  the  same  attribute  (differently  realized)  in 
all  the  analogues  (as  in  univocal  predication)  but  rather  a  simi- 
larity in  the  relation  or  proportion  in  which  each  analogue 
embodies  or  realizes  some  attribute  or  attributes  peculiar  to  itself. 
Seeing  is  to  the  eye  as  understanding  is  to  the  mind  ;  smiling  is 
to  the  countenance  as  the  pleasing  appearance  of  its  natural 
features  is  to  the  valley.  Rain  is  to  the  parched  earth,  and  God 
is  to  the  devout  soul,  as  drink  is  to  the  thirsty  person.  It  will  be 
noted  that  in  all  such  cases  the  analogical  concept  is  affirmed 
primarily  and  properly  of  some  one  thing  (the  analogum  prin- 


38  ONTOLOGY 

ceps\  and  of  the  other  only  secondarily,  and  relatively  to  the 
former. 

Now,  if  we  reflect  on  the  manner  in  which  being  is  affirmed  of 
its  various  modes  (e.g.  of  the  infinite  and  the  finite ;  or  of  sub- 
stance and  accident ;  or  of  spiritual  and  corporeal  substances  ; 
or  of  quantities,  or  qualities,  or  causes,  etc.)  we  can  see  firstly 
that  although  these  differ  from  one  another  by  all  that  each  of 
them  is,  by  the  whole  being  of  each,  yet  there  is  an  all-pervading 
similarity  between  the  relations  which  these  modes  bear  each  to 
its  own  existence.  All  have,  or  can  have,  actual  existence :  each 
according  to  the  grade  of  perfection  of  its  own  reality.  If  we 
conceive  infinite  being  as  the  cause  of  all  finite  beings,  then  the 
former  exists  in  a  manner  appropriate  to  its  all-perfect  reality, 
and  finite  beings  in  a  manner  proportionate  to  their  limited 
realities  ;  and  so  of  the  various  modes  of  finite  being  among 
themselves.  Moreover,  we  can  see  secondly,  as  will  be  explained 
more  fully  below,1  that  being  is  affirmed  ofthe  finite  by  virtue 
of  its  dependence  on  the  infinite,  and  of  accident  by  virtue  of  its 
dependence  on  substance.2  Being  or  reality  is  therefore  predi- 
cated of  its  modes  by  analogy  of  proportion? 

Is  a  concept,  .when  applied  in  this  way,  one,  or  is  it  really 
manifold  ?  It  is  not  simply  one,  for  this  would  yield  univocal 
predication ;  nor  is  it  simply  manifold,  for  this  would  give  equi- 
vocal predication.  Being,  considered  in  its  vague,  imperfect, 
inadequate  sense,  as  involving  some  common  or  similar  propor- 
tion or  relation  to  existence  in  all  its  analogues,  is  one  ;  con- 
sidered as  representing  clearly  and  adequately  what  is  thus 
similarly  related  to  each  of  the  analogues,  it  is  manifold. 

Analogy  of  proportion  is  the  basis  of  the  figure  of  speech 
known  as  metaphor.  It  would  be  a  mistake,  however,  to  infer 
from  this  that  what  is  thus  analogically  predicated  of  a  number 
of  things  belongs  intrinsically  and  properly  only  to  one  of  them, 
being  transferred  by  a  mere  extrinsic  denomination  to  the  others  ; 
and  that  therefore  it  does  not  express  any  genuine  knowledge 

1  C/.  infra,  ch.  viii. 

2  C/.  KLEUTGEN,  Philosophic  der  Vorzeit,  §§  599,  600. 

3  This,  of  course,  is  the  proper  sort  of  analogical  predication  :  the  predication 
based  upon  similarity  of  proportions  or  relations.     Etymologically,  analogy  means 
equality  of  proportions  (cf.  Logic,  ii.,  p.  160).     On  the  whole  subject  the  student 
may  consult  with  profit  Cajetan's  Opusculum  de  Nominum  Analogia,  published  as 
an  appendix  to  vol.  iv.  of  St.  Thomas'  Quczstiones  Disputatce  in  De  Maria's  edition 
(1883). 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         39 

on  our  part  about  the  nature  of  these  other  things.  It  does  give 
us  real  knowledge  about  them.  Metaphor  is  not  equivocation  ; 
but  perhaps  more  usually  it  is  understood  not  to  give  us  real 
knowledge  because  it  is  understood  to  be  based  on  resemblances 
that  are  merely  fanciful,  not  real.  Still,  no  matter  how  slender 
and  remote  be  the  proportional  resemblance  on  which  the  ana- 
logical use  of  language  is  based,  in  so  far  forth  as  it  has  such  a 
real  basis  it  gives  us  real  insight  into  the  nature  of  the  analogues. 
And  if  we  hesitate  to  describe  such  a  use  of  language  as  "  meta- 
phorical," this  is  only  because  "  metaphor  "  perhaps  too  commonly 
connotes  a  certain  transferred  and  improper  extension  of  the 
meaning  of  terms,  based  upon  a  purely  fanciful  resemblance. 

All  our  language  is  primarily  and  properly  expressive  of 
concepts  derived  from  the  sensible  appearances  of  material 
realities.  As  applied  to  the  suprasensible,  intelligible  aspects  of 
these  realities,  such  as  substance  and  cause,  or  to  spiritual  realities, 
such  as  the  human  soul  and  God,  it  is  analogical  in  another  sense ; 
not  as  opposed  to  univocal,  but  as  opposed  to  proper.  That  is, 
it  expresses  concepts  which  are  not  formed  directly  from  the 
presence  of  the  things  which  they  signify,  but  are  gathered  from 
other  things  to  which  the  latter  are  necessarily  related  in  a 
variety  of  ways.1  Considering  the  origin  of  our  knowledge,  the 
material,  the  sensible,  the  phenomenal,  comes  first  in  order,  and 
moulds  our  concepts  and  language  primarily  to  its  own  proper 
representation  and  expression  ;  while  the  spiritual,  the  intelligible, 
the  substantial,  comes  later,  and  must  make  use  of  the  concepts 
and  language  thus  already  moulded. 

If  we  consider,  however,  not  the  order  in  which  we  get  our 
knowledge,  but  the  order  of  reality  in  the  objects  of  our  know- 
ledge, being  or  reality  is  primarily  and  more  properly  predicated 
of  the  infinite  than  of  the  finite,  of  the  Creator  than  of  the 
creature,  of  the  spiritual  than  of  the  material,  of  substances  than 
of  their  accidents  and  sensible  manifestations  or  phenomena. 
Yet  we  do  not  predicate  being  or  reality  of  the  finite,  or  of 
creatures,  in  a  mere  transferred,  extrinsic,  improper  sense,  as  if 
these  were  mere  manifestations  of  the  infinite,  or  mere  effects  of 
the  First  Cause,  to  which  alone  reality  would  properly  belong. 
For  creatures,  finite  things,  are  in  a  true  and  proper  sense  also 
real. 

Duns  Scotus  and  those  who  think  with  him  contend  that  the  concept  of 
being,  derived  as  it  is  from  our  experience  of  finite  being,  if  applied  only 

1  C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §§  40-42. 


40  ONTOLOGY 

analogically  to  infinite  being  would  give  us  no  genuine  knowledge  about  the 
latter.  They  maintain  that  whenever  a  universal  concept  is  applied  to  the 
objects  in  which  it  is  realized  intrinsically ',  it  is  affirmed  of  these  objects 
univocally.  The  notion  of  being,  in  its  most  imperfect,  inadequate,  indeter- 
minate sense,  is,  they  say,  one  and  the  same  in  so  far  forth  as  it  is  applicable 
to  the  infinite  and  the  finite,  and  to  all  the  modes  of  the  finite  ;  and  it  is 
therefore  predicated  of  all  univocally.1  But  although  they  apply  the  con- 
cept of  being  univocally  to  the  infinite  and  the  finite,  i.e.  to  God  and  creatures, 
they  admit  that  the  reality  corresponding  to  this  univocal  concept  is  totally 
different  in  God  and  in  creatures :  that  God  differs  by  all  that  He  is  from 
creatures,  and  they  by  all  that  they  are  from  Him.  While,  however,  Scotists 
emphasize  the  formal  oneness  or  identity  of  the  indeterminate  common  con- 
cept, followers  of  St.  Thomas  emphasize  the  fact  that  the  various  modes  of 
being  differ  totally,  by  all  that  each  of  them  is,  from  one  another  ;  and,  from 
this  radical  diversity  in  the  modes  of  being,  they  infer  that  the  common  con- 
cept should  not  be  regarded  as  simply  the  same,  but  only  as  proportionally 
the  same,  as  expressive  of  a  similar  relation  of  each  intrinsically  different 
mode  of  reality  to  actual  existence. 

Thomists  lay  still  greater  stress,  perhaps,  upon  the  second  consideration 
referred  to  above,  as  a  reason  for  regarding  being  as  an  analogical  concept 
when  affirmed  of  Creator  and  creature,  or  of  substance  and  accident :  the 
consideration  that  the  finite  is  dependent  on  the  infinite,  and  accident  on  sub- 
stance. If  being  is  realized  in  a  true  and  proper  sense,  and  intrinsically,  as 
it  undoubtedly  is,  in  whatever  is  distinguishable  from  nothingness,  why  not 
say  that  we  should  affirm  being  or  reality  of  all  things  "  either  as  a  genus  in 
the  strict  sense,  or  else  in  some  sense  not  analogical  but  proper,  after  the 
manner  in  which  we  predicate  a  genus  of  its  species  and  individuals  ?  .  .  . 
Since  the  object  of  our  universal  idea  of  being  is  admitted  to  be  really  in  all 
things,  we  can  evidently  abstract  from  what  is  proper  to  substance  and  to 
accident,  just  as  we  abstract  from  what  is  proper  to  plants  and  to  animals 
when  we  affirm  of  these  that  they  are  living  things."  2 

"In  reply  to  this  difficulty,"  Father  Kleutgen  continues,3  "we  say  in 
the  first  place  that  the  idea  of  being  is  in  truth  less  analogical  and  more 
proper  than  any  belonging  to  the  first  sort  of  analogy  [i.e.  of  attribution],  and 
that  therefore  it  approaches  more  closely  to  generic  concepts  properly  so 
called.  At  the  same  time  the  difference  which  separates  both  from  the 
latter  concepts  remains.  For  a  name  applied  to  many  things  is  analogical  if 
what  it  signifies  is  realized  par  excellence  in  one,  and  in  the  others  only 
subordinately  and  dependently  on  that.  Hence  it  is  that  Aristotle  regards 
predication  as  analogical  when  something  is  affirmed  of  many  things  (i) 
either  because  these  have  a  certain  relation  to  some  one  thing,  (2}  or  because 
they  depend  on  some  one  thing.  In  the  former  case  the  thing  signified  by 
the  name  is  really  and  properly  found  only  in  one  single  thing,  and  is  affirmed 
of  all  the  others  only  in  virtue  of  some  real  relation  of  these  to  the  former, 
whether  this  be  (a)  that  these  things  merely  resemble  that  single  thing 

1C/.  SCOTUS,  op.  cit.,  i.,  pp.  318-22,  125-131,  102-7   (especially  p.   128,  Ad 
tertium  ;  p.  131,  Ad  sextum  ;  p.  321,  Ad  tertium. 
2  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  599. 
9  ibid.,  §600. 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         41 

[metaphor],  or  (b]  bear  some  other  relation  to  it,  such  as  that  of  effect  to 
cause,  etc.  [metonymy].  In  the  latter  case  the  thing  signified  by  the  name  is 
really  in  each  of  the  things  of  which  it  is  affirmed  ;  but  it  is  in  one  alone  par 
excellence,  and  in  the  others  only  by  depending,  for  its  very  existence  in 
them,  on  that  one.  Now  the  object  of  the  term  being  is  found  indeed  in 
accidents,  e.g.  in  quantity,  colour,  shape  ;  but  certainly  it  must  be  applied 
primarily  to  substance,  and  to  accidents  only  dependently  on  the  latter :  for 
quantity,  colour,  shape  can  have  being  only  because  the  corporeal  substance 
possesses  these  determinations.  But  this  is  not  at  all  the  case  with  a  genus  and 
its  species.  These  differ  from  the  genus,  not  by  any  such  dependence,  but 
by  the  addition  of  some  special  perfection  to  the  constituents  of  the  genus  ; 
for  example,  in  the  brute  beast  sensibility  is  added  to  vegetative  life,  and  in 
man  intelligence  is  added  to  sensibility.  Here  there  is  no  relation  of 
dependence  for  existence.  Even  if  we  considered  human  life  as  that  of 
which  life  is  principally  asserted,  we  could  not  say  that  plants  and  brute 
beasts  so  depended  for  their  life  on  the  life  of  man  that  we  could  not  affirm 
life  of  them  except  as  dependent  on  the  life  of  man  :  as  we  cannot  attribute 
being  to  accidents  except  by  reason  of  their  dependence  on  sub- 
stance. Hence  it  is  that  we  can  consider  apart,  and  in  itself,  life  in 
general,  and  attribute  this  to  all  living  things  without  relating  it  to  any  other 
being."  * 

"It  might  still  be  objected  that  the  one  single  being  of  which  we  may 
affirm  life  primarily  and  principally,  ought  to  be  not  human  life,  but  absolute 
life.  And  between  this  divine  life  and  the  life  of  all  other  beings  there  is  a 
relation  of  dependence,  which  reaches  even  to  the  very  existence  of  life  in 
these  other  beings.  In  fact  all  life  depends  on  the  absolute  life,  not  indeed 
in  the  way  accident  depends  on  substance,  but  in  a  manner  no  less  real  and 
far  more  excellent.  This  is  entirely  true  ;  but  what  are  we  to  conclude  from 
it  if  not  precisely  this,  which  scholasticism  teaches  :  that  the  perfections 
found  in  the  various  species  of  creatures  can  be  affirmed  of  these  in  the 
same  sense  (univoce),  but  that  they  can  be  affirmed  of  God  and  creatures 
only  analogically  ?  " 

"  From  all  of  which  we  can  understand  why  it  is  that  in  regard  to 
genera  and  species  the  analogy  is  in  the  things  but  not  in  our  thoughts,  while  in 
regard  to  substance  and  accidents  it  is  both  in  the  things  and  in  our  thoughts  : 
a  difference  which  rests  not  solely  on  our  manner  of  conceiving  things,  nor 
a  fortiori  on  mere  caprice  or  fancy,  but  which  has  its  basis  in  the  very 
nature  of  the  things  themselves.  For  though  in  the  former  case  there  is  a 
certain  analogy  in  the  things  themselves,  inasmuch  as  the  same  nature,  that 
of  the  genus,  is  realized  in  the  species  in  different  ways,  still,  as  we  have 
seen,  that  is  not  sufficient,  without  the  relation  of  dependence,  to  yield  a  basis 
for  analogy  in  our  thoughts.  For  it  is  precisely  because  accident,  as  a 
determination  of  substance,  presupposes  this  latter,  that  being  cannot  be 
affirmed  of  accident  except  as  dependent  on  substance." 

These  paragraphs  will  have  shown  with  sufficient  clearness  why  we  should 
regard  being  not  as  an  univocal  but  as  an  analogical  concept,  when  referred 
to  God  and  creatures,  or  to  substance  and  accident.  For  the  rest,  the  diverg- 
ence between  the  Scotist  and  the  Thomist  views  is  not  very  important,  be- 

1  SUAREZ,  Metaph.,  Dist.  xxviii.,  §  3  ;  Dist.  xxxii.,  §  2. 


42  ONTOLOGY 

cause  Scotists  also  will  deny  that  being  is  a  genus  of  which  the  infinite  and  the 
finite  would  be  species  ;  finite  and  infinite  are  not  differentiae  superadded  to 
being,  inasmuch  as  each  of  these  differs  by  its  whole  reality,  and  not  merely 
by  a  determining  portion,  from  the  other ;  it  is  owing  to  the  limitations  of  our 
abstractive  way  of  understanding  reality  that  we  have  to  conceive  the  infinite 
by  first  conceiving  being  in  the  abstract,  and  then  mentally  determining  this 
concept  by  another,  namely,  by  the  concept  of  "  infinite  mode  of  being  " x ; 
the  infinite,  and  whatever  perfections  we  predicate  formally  of  the  infinite, 
transcend  all  genera,  species  and  differentiae,  because  the  distinction  of  being 
into  infinite  and  finite  is  prior  to  the  distinction  into  genera,  species  and  dif- 
ferentiae ;  this  latter  distinction  applying  only  to  finite,  not  to  infinite  being.2 

The  observations  we  have  just  been  making  in  regard  to  the 
analogy  of  being  are  of  greater  importance  than  the  beginner  can 
be  expected  to  realize.  A  proper  appreciation  of  the  way  in 
which  being  or  reality  is  conceived  by  the  mind  to  appertain 
to  the  data  of  our  experience,  is  indispensable  to  the  defence  of 
Theism  as  against  Agnosticism  and  Pantheism. 

3.  REAL  BEING  AND  LOGICAL  BEING. — We  may  next  illus- 
trate the  notion  of  being  by  approaching  it  from  another  stand- 
point— by  examining  a  fundamental  distinction  which  may  be 
drawn  between  real  being  (ens  reale)  and  logical  being  (ens 
rationis}. 

We  derive  all  our  knowledge,  through  external  and  internal 
sense  perception,  from  the  domain  of  actually  existing  things, 
these  things  including  our  own  selves  and  our  own  minds.  We 
form,  from  the  data  of  sense-consciousness,  by  an  intellectual 
process  proper,  mental  representations  of  an  abstract  and  universal 
character,  which  reveal  to  us  partial  aspects  and  phases  of  the 
natures  of  things.  We  have  no  intuitive  intellectual  insight  into 
these  natures.  It  is  only  by  abstracting  their  various  aspects,  by 
comparing  these  in  judgments,  and  reaching  still  further  aspects 
by  inferences,  that  we  progress  in  our  knowledge  of  things — 
gradually,  step  by  step,  discursive',  discurrendo.  All  this  implies 
reflection  on,  and  comparison  of,  our  own  ideas,  our  mental  views 
of  things.  It  involves  the  processes  of  defining  and  classifying, 
affirming  and  denying,  abstracting  and  generalizing,  analysing 
and  synthesizing,  comparing  and  relating  in  a  variety  of  ways 
the  objects  grasped  by  our  thought.  Now  in  all  these  complex 
functions,  by  which  alone  the  mind  can  interpret  rationally  what 
is  given  to  it,  by  which  alone,  in  other  words,  it  can  know  reality, 
the  mind  necessarily  and  inevitably  forms  for  itself  (and  ex- 

1  SCOTUS,  op.  cit.,  i.,  pp.  106-7,  128-9.  2  ibid.,  p.  107. 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         43 

presses  in  intelligible  language)  a  series  of  concepts  which  have  for 
their  objects  only  the  modes  in  which,  and  the  relations  by  means 
of  which,  it  makes  such  gradual  progress  in  its  interpretation  of 
what  is  given  to  it,  in  its  knowledge  of  the  real.  These  concepts 
are  called  secundae  intentiones  mentis — concepts  of  the  second 
order,  so  to  speak.  And  their  objects,  the  modes  and  mutual 
relations  of  our  primae  intentiones  or  direct  concepts,  are  called 
entia  rationis — logical  entities.  For  example,  abstractness  is 
a  mode  which  affects  not  the  reality  which  we  apprehend  intel- 
lectually, but  the  concept  by  which  we  apprehend  it.  So,  too,  is 
the  universality  of  a  concept,  its  communicability  or  applicability 
to  an  indefinite  multitude  of  similar  realities — the  "  intentio  uni- 
versalitatis"  as  it  is  called — a  mode  of  concept,  not  of  the  realities 
represented  by  the  latter.  So,  likewise,  is  the  absence  of  other 
reality  than  that  represented  by  the  concept,  the  relative  nothing- 
ness or  non-being  by  contrast  with  which  the  concept  is  realized 
as  positive ;  and  the  absolute  nothingness  or  non-being  which  is 
the  logical  correlative  of  the  concept  of  being ;  and  the  static, 
unchanging  self-identity  of  the  object  as  conceived  in  the  ab- 
stract.1 These  are  not  modes  of  reality  as  it  is  but  as  it  is  con- 
ceived. Again,  the  manifold  logical  relations  which  we  establish 
between  our  concepts — relations  of  (extensive  or  intensive)  identity 
or  distinction,  inclusion  or  inherence,  etc. — are  logical  entities, 
entia  rationis :  relations  of  genus,  species,  differentia,  proprium, 
accidens ;  the  affirmative  or  negative  relation  between  predi- 
cate and  subject  in  judgment ; 2  the  mutual  relations  of  ante- 
cedent and  consequent  in  inference.  Now  all  these  logical 
entities,  or  objecta  secundae  intentionis  mentis^  are  relations  estab- 
lished by  the  mind  itself  between  its  own  thoughts ;  they  have, 
no  doubt,  a  foundation  in  the  real  objects  of  those  thoughts  as 
well  as  in  the  constitution  and  limitations  of  the  mind  itself;  but 
they  have  themselves,  and  can  have,  no  other  being  than  that 
which  they  have  as  products  of  thought.  Their  sole  being  consists 
in  being  thought  of.  They  are  necessary  creations  or  products  of 
the  thought-process  as  this  goes  on  in  the  human  mind.  We  see 

1  C/.  KLEUTGEN,  La  philosophic  scolastique  ("Die  Philosophic  der  Vorzeit"). 
Fr.  trans,  by  Sierp  (Paris,  1868),  vol.  i.,  p.  66,  §  35. 

2  The  logical  copula,  which  expresses  this  relation  and  asserts  the  truth  of  the 
judgment,  expresses,  of  course,  a  logical  entity,  an  ens  rationis.     True  judgments 
may  be  stated  about  logical  entities  as  well  as  about  realities.     But  since  the  former 
can  be  conceived  only  after  the  manner  of  the  latter,  the  appropriateness  of  using 
the  verb  which  expresses  existence  or  reality,  as  the  logical  copula,  will  be  at 
once  apparent.     Cf.  Logic,  i.,  p.  249,  n.  i. 


44  ONTOLOGY 

that  it  is  only  by  means  of  these  relations  we  can  progress  in 
understanding  things.  In  the  thought-process  we  cannot  help 
bringing  them  to  light — and  thinking  them  after  the  manner  of 
realities,  per  modum  entis.  Whatever  we  think  we  must  think 
through  the  concept  of  "  being  "  ;  whatever  we  conceive  we  must 
conceive  as  "being";  but  on  reflection  we  easily  see  that  such 
entities  as  "nothingness,"  "negation  or  absence  or  privation  of 
being,"  "  universality,"  "  predicate  " — and,  in  general,  all  relations 
established  by  our  own  thought  between  our  own  ideas  repre- 
sentative of  reality — can  have  themselves  no  reality  proper,  no 
actual  or  possible  existence,  other  than  that  which  they  get  from 
the  mind  in  virtue  of  its  making  them  objects  of  its  own  thought. 
Hence  the  scholastic  definition  of  a  logical  entity  or  ens  rationis 
as  "  that  which  has  objective  being  merely  in  the  intellect " : 
" illud  quod  habet  esse  objective  tantum  in  intellectu,  seu  .  .  .  id 
quod  a  ratione  excogitalur  ut  ens,  cum  tamen  in  se  entitatem  non 
habeat".1  Of  course  the  mental  process  by  which  we  think  such 
entities,  the  mental  state  in  which  they  are  held  in  consciousness, 
is  just  as  real  as  any  other  mental  process  or  state.  But  the 
entity  which  is  thus  held  in  consciousness  has  and  can  have  no 
other  reality  than  what  it  has  by  being  an  object  of  thought. 
And  this  precisely  is  what  distinguishes  it  from  real  being,  from 
reality ;  for  the  latter,  besides  the  ideal  existence  it  has  in  the 
mind  which  thinks  of  it,  has,  or  at  least  can  have,  a  real  existence 
of  its  own,  independently  altogether  of  our  thinking  about  it. 
We  assume  here,  of  course — what  is  established  elsewhere,  as 
against  the  subjective  idealism  of  phenomenists  and  the  objective 
idealism  of  Berkeley — that  the  reality  of  actual  things  does  not 
consist  in  their  being  perceived  or  thought  of,  that  their  "esse" 
is  not  "per dpi"  that  they  have  a  reality  other  than  and  in- 
dependent of  their  actual  presence  to  the  thought  of  any  human 
mind.  And  even  purely  possible  things,  even  the  creatures  of 
our  own  fancy,  the  fictions  of  fable  and  romance,  could,  absolutely 
speaking  and  without  any  contradiction,  have  an  existence  in  the 
actual  order,  in  addition  to  the  mental  existence  they  receive 
from  those  who  fancy  them.  Such  entities,  therefore,  differ  from 
entia  rationis ;  they,  too,  are  real  beings. 

What  the  reality  of  purely  possible  things  is  we  shall  discuss  later  on. 
Actually  existing  things  at  all  events  we  assume  to  be  given  to  the  knowing 
mind,  not  to  be  created  by  the  latter.  Even  in  regard  to  these,  however,  we 

1  SUAREZ,  Metaph.,  Dist.  54,  §  i.,  6. 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         45 

must  remember  that  the  mind  in  knowing  them,  in  interpreting  them,  in  seek- 
ing to  penetrate  the  nature  of  them,  is  not  purely  passive  ;  that  reality  as 
known  to  us — or,  in  other  words,  our  knowledge  of  reality — is  the  product  of 
a  twofold  factor :  the  subjective  which  is  the  mind,  and  the  objective  which 
is  the  extramental  reality  acting  on,  and  thus  revealing  itself  to,  the  mind. 
Hence  it  is  that  when  we  come  to  analyse  in  detail  our  knowledge  of  the 
nature  of  things — or,  in  other  words,  the  natures  of  things  as  revealed  to  our 
minds — it  will  not  be  always  easy  to  distinguish  in  each  particular  case  the 
properties,  aspects,  relations,  distinctions,  etc.,  which  are  real  (in  the  sense  of 
being  there  in  the  reality  independently  of  the  consideration  of  the  mind)  from 
those  that  are  merely  logical  (in  the  sense  of  being  produced  and  superadded 
to  the  reality  by  the  mental  process  itself).1  Yet  it  is  obviously  a  matter  of 
the  very  first  importance  to  determine,  as  far  as  may  be  possible,  to  what 
extent  our  knowledge  of  reality  is  not  merely  a  mental  interpretation,  but  a 
mental  construction,  of  the  latter  ;  and  whether,  if  there  be  a  constructive  or 
constitutive  factor  in  thought,  this  should  be  regarded  as  interfering  with 
the  validity  of  thought  as  representative  of  reality.  This  problem — of  the 
relation  of  the  ens  rationis  to  the  ens  reale  in  the  process  of  cognition — has 
given  rise  to  discussions  which,  in  modern  times,  have  largely  contributed  to 
the  formation  of  that  special  branch  of  philosophical  enquiry  which  is  called 
Epistemology.  But  it  must  not  be  imagined  that  this  very  problem  was  not 
discussed,  and  very  widely  discussed,  by  philosophers  long  before  the  problem 
of  the  validity  of  knowledge  assumed  the  prominent  place  it  has  won  for 
itself  in  modern  philosophy.  Even  a  moderate  familiarity  with  scholastic 
philosophy  will  enable  the  student  to  recognize  this  problem,  in  a  variety  of 
phases,  in  the  discussions  of  the  medieval  schoolmen  concerning  the  concepts 
of  matter  and  form,  the  simplicity  and  composition  of  beings,  and  the  nature 
of  the  various  distinctions — whether  logical,  virtual,  formal,  or  real — which 
the  mind  either  invents  or  detects  in  the  realities  it  endeavours  to  understand 
and  explain. 

4.  REAL  BEING  AND  IDEAL  BEING. — The  latter  of  these 
expressions  has  a  multiplicity  of  kindred  meanings.  We  use  it 
here  in  the  sense  of  "being  known''  i.e.  to  signify  the  "esse 
intentional*"  the  mental  presence,  which,  in  the  scholastic  theory 
of  knowledge,  an  entity  of  whatsoever  kind,  whether  real  or 
logical,  must  have  in  the  mind  of  the  knower  in  order  that  he 
be  aware  of  that  entity.  A  mere  logical  entity,  as  we  have  seen, 
has  and  can  have  no  other  mode  of  being  than  this  which  con- 
sists in  being  an  object  of  the  mind's  awareness.  All  real  being, 
too,  when  it  becomes  an  object  of  any  kind  of  human  cognition 
whatsoever — of  intellectual  thought,  whether  direct  or  reflex ; 
of  sense  perception,  whether  external  or  internal — must  obtain 
this  sort  of  mental  presence  or  mental  existence :  thereby  alone 
can  it  become  an  "objectum  cognitum".  Only  by  such  mental 

1  c/.  LO&C,  i.,  pp.  28-9. 


46  ONTOLOGY 

mirroring,  or  reproduction,  or  reconstruction,  can  reality  become 
so  related  and  connected  with  mind  as  to  reveal  itself  to  mind. 
Under  this  peculiar  relation  which  we  call  cognition,  the  mind, 
as  we  know  from  psychology  and  epistemology,  is  not  passive : 
if  reality  revealed  itself  immediately,  as  it  is,  to  a  purely  passive 
mind  (were  such  conceivable),  the  existence  of  error  would  be 
unaccountable ;  but  the  mind  is  not  passive :  under  the  influence 
of  the  reality  it  forms  the  intellectual  concept  (the  verbum  mentale), 
or  the  sense  percept  (the  species  sensibilis  expressa),  in  and  through 
which,  and  by  means  of  which,  it  attains  to  its  knowledge  of  the 
real. 

But  prior  (ontologically)  to  this  mental  existence,  and  as  partial 
cause  of  the  latter,  there  is  the  real  existence  or  being,  which 
reality  has  independently  of  its  being  known  by  any  individual 
human  mind.  Real  being,  then,  as  distinguished  here  from  ideal 
being,  is  that  which  exists  or  can  exist  extramentally,  whether  it 
is  known  by  the  human  mind  or  not,  i.e.  whether  it  exists  also 
mentally  or  not 

That  there  is  such  real  being,  apart  from  the  "  thought  "-being  whereby 
the  mind  is  constituted  formally  knowing,  is  proved  elsewhere ;  as  also  that 
this  esse  intentionale  has  modes  which  cannot  be  attributed  to  the  esse  reale. 
We  merely  note  these  points  here  in  order  to  indicate  the  errors  involved  in  the 
opposite  contentions.  Our  concepts  are  characterized  by  abstractness,  by  a 
consequent  static  immutability,  by  a  plurality  often  resulting  from  purely  mental 
distinctions,  by  a  universality  which  transcends  those  distinctions  and  unifies 
the  variety  of  all  subordinate  concepts  in  the  widest  concept  of  being.  Now 
if,  for  example,  we  attribute  the  unifying  mental  mode  of  universality  to  real 
being,  we  must  draw  the  pantheistic  conclusion  that  all  real  being  is  one  :  the 
logical  outcome  of  extreme  realism.  If,  again,  we  transfer  purely  mental 
distinctions  to  the  unity  of  the  Absolute  or  Supreme  Being,  thus  making 
them  real,  we  thereby  deny  infinite  perfection  to  the  most  perfect  being  con- 
ceivable :  an  error  of  which  some  catholic  philosopers  of  the  later  middle 
ages  have  been  accused  with  some  foundation.  If,  finally,  we  identify  the 
esse  reale  with  the  esse  intentionale,  and  this  with  the  thought-process  itself, 
we  find  ourselves  at  the  starting-point  of  Hegelian  monism.1 

5.  FUNDAMENTAL  DISTINCTIONS  IN  REAL  BEING. — Leaving 
logical  and  ideal  being  aside,  and  fixing  our  attention  exclusively 
on  real  being,  we  may  indicate  here  a  few  of  the  most  fundamental 
distinctions  which  experience  enables  us  to  recognize  in  our  study 
of  the  universal  order  of  things. 

(a)  Possible  or  Potential  Being  and  Actual  Being. — The  first 
of  these  distinctions  is  that  between  possibility  and  actuality,  be- 

1Cf.  KLEUTGEN,  of.  cit.,  §§  551-2. 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         47 

tween  that  which  can  be  and  that  which  actually  is.  For 
a  proper  understanding  of  this  distinction,  which  will  be  dealt 
with  presently,  it  is  necessary  to  note  here  the  following  divisions 
of  actual  being,  which  will  be  studied  in  detail  later  on. 

(b)  Infinite  Being  and  Finite  Beings. — All  people  have  a 
sufficiently  clear  notion  of  Infinite  Being,  or  Infinitely  Perfect 
Being  :  though  not  all  philosophers  are  agreed  as  to  how  pre- 
cisely we  get  this  notion,  or  whether  there  actually  exists  such  a 
being,  or  whether  if  such  being  does  exist  we  can  attain  to  a 
certain  knowledge  of  such  existence.  By  infinite  being  we  mean 
a  being  possessing  all  conceivable  perfections  in  the  most  perfect 
conceivable  manner ;  and  by  finite  beings  all  such  beings  as  have 
actually  any  conceivable  limitation  to  their  perfection.  About 
these  nominal  definitions  there  is  no  dispute ;  and  scholasticism 
identifies  their  respective  objects  with  God  and  creatures. 

{c]  Necessary  Being  and  Contingent  Beings. — Necessary  being 
we  conceive  as  that  being  which  exists  of  necessity  :  being  which 
if  conceived  at  all  cannot  be  conceived  as  non-existent  :  being  in 
the  very  concept  of  which  is  essentially  involved  the  concept  of 
actual  existence :  so  that  the  attempt  to  conceive  such  being  as 
non-existent  would  be  an  attempt  to  conceive  what  would  be 
self-contradictory.  Contingent  being,  on  the  other  hand,  is  being 
which  is  conceived  not  to  exist  of  necessity  :  being  which  may 
be  conceived  as  not  actually  existent :  being  in  the  concept  of 
which  is  not  involved  the  concept  of  actual  existence.  The  same 
observations  apply  to  this  distinction  as  to  the  preceding  one. 
It  is  obvious  that  any  being  which  we  regard  as  actual  we  must 
regard  either  as  necessary  or  as  contingent ;  and,  secondly,  that 
necessary  being  must  be  considered  as  absolutely  independent, 
as  having  its  actual  existence  from  itself,  by  its  own  nature; 
while  contingent  being  must  be  considered  as  dependent  for  its 
actual  existence  on  some  being  other  than  itself.  Hence  neces- 
sary being  is  termed  Ens  a  se,  contingent  being  Ens  ab  alio. 

(d)  Absolute  Being  and  Relative  Beings. — In  modern  philo- 
sophy the  terms  " absolute"  and  "  relative,"  as  applied  to  being, 
correspond  roughly  with  the  terms  "  God  "  and  "  creatures  "  in 
the  usage  of  theistic  philosophers.  But  the  former  pair  of  terms 
is  really  of  wider  application  than  the  latter.  The  term  absolute 
means,  etymologically,  that  which  is  loosed,  unfettered,  disengaged 
or  free  from  bonds  (absolutum,  ab-solvere,  solvo  =  se-luo,  from 
\vco) :  that,  therefore,  which  is  not  bound  up  with  anything  else, 


48  ONTOLOGY 

which  is  in  some  sense  self-sufficing,  independent;  while  the 
relative  is  that  which  is  in  some  way  bound  up  with  something  else, 
and  which  is  so  far  not  self-sufficing  or  independent.  That, 
therefore,  is  ontologically  absolute  which  is  in  some  sense  self- 
sufficing,  independent  of  other  things,  in  its  existence;  while 
the  ontologically  relative  is  that  which  depends  in  some  real  way 
for  its  existence  on  something  else.  Again,  that  is  logically 
absolute  which  can  be  conceived  and  known  by  us  without  reference 
to  anything  else;  while  the  logically  relative  is  that  which  we 
can  conceive  and  know  only  through  our  knowledge  of  some- 
thing else.  And  since  we  usually  name  things  according  to  the 
way  in  which  we  conceive  them,  we  regard  as  absolute  any 
being  which  is  by  itself  •&&&  of  itself  that  which  we  conceive  it  to 
be,  or  that  which  its  name  implies  ;  and  as  relative  any  being 
which  is  what  its  name  implies  only  in  virtue  of  some  relation  to 
something  else.1  Thus,  a  man  is  a  man  absolutely,  while  he  is 
a  friend  only  relatively  to  others. 

It  is  obvious  that  the  primary  and  general  meaning  of  the 
terms  "  absolute  "  and  "  relative  "  can  be  applied  and  extended  in 
a  variety  of  ways.  For  instance,  all  being  may  be  said  to  be 
"  relative  "  to  the  knowing  mind,  in  the  sense  that  all  knowledge 
involves  a  transcendental  relation  of  the  known  object  to  the 
knowing  subject.  In  this  widest  and  most  improper  sense  even 
God  Himself  is  relative,  not  however  as  being,  but  as  known. 
Again,  when  we  apply  the  same  attribute  to  a  variety  of  things 
we  may  see  that  it  is  found  in  one  of  them  in  the  most  perfect 
manner  conceivable,  or  at  least  in  a  fuller  and  higher  degree 
than  it  is  found  in  the  others;  and  that  it  is  found  in  these 
others  only  with  some  sort  of  subordination  to,  and  depend- 
ence on,  the  former  :  we  then  say  that  it  belongs  to  this  primarily 
or  absolutely ',  and  to  the  others  only  secondarily  or  relatively. 
This  is  a  less  improper  application  of  the  terms  than  in  the  pre- 
ceding case.  What  we  have  especially  to  remember  here  is  that 
there  are  many  different  kinds  of  dependence  or  subordination, 
all  alike  giving  rise  to  the  same  usage. 

Hence,  applying  the  terms  absolute  and  relative  to  the  predi- 
cate "  being  "  or  "  real  "or  "  reality,"  it  is  obvious  in  the  first 
place  that  the  potential  as  such  can  be  called  "being,"  or  "  re- 
ality "  only  in  relation  to  the  actual.  It  is  the  actual  that  is 
being  simpliciter,  par  excellence ;  the  potential  is  so  only  in 

»  C/.  Logic,  i.,  pp.  70-*, 


BEING  AND  ITS  PRIMARY  DETERMINATIONS         49 

relation  to  this.1  Again,  substances  may  be  termed  beings  ab- 
solutely, while  accidents  are  beings  only  relatively,  because  of 
their  dependence  on  substances ;  though  this  relation  is  quite 
different  from  the  relation  of  potential  to  actual  being.  Finally 
all  finite,  contingent  realities,  actual  and  possible,  are  what  they 
are  only  because  of  their  dependence  on  the  Infinite  and  Neces- 
sary Being:  and  hence  the  former  are  relative  and  the  latter 
absolute ;  though  here  again  the  relation  is  different  from  that  of 
accident  to  substance,  or  of  potential  to  actual. 

Since  the  order  of  being  includes  all  orders,  and  since  a  being 
is  absolutely  such-or-such  in  any  order  only  when  that  being 
realizes  in  all  its  fulness  and  purity  such-or-such  reality,  it  follows 
that  the  being  which  realizes  in  all  its  fulness  the  reality  of  being 
is  the  Absolute  Being  in  the  highest  possible  sense  of  this  term. 
This  concept  of  Absolute  Being  is  the  richest  and  most  compre- 
hensive of  all  possible  concepts  :  it  is  the  very  antithesis  of  that 
other  concept  of  "  being  in  general  "  which  is  common  to  every- 
thing and  distinguished  only  from  nothingness.  It  includes  in 
itself  all  actual  and  possible  modes  and  grades  and  perfections 
of  finite  things,  apart  from  their  limitations,  embodying  all  of 
them  in  the  one  highest  and  richest  concept  of  that  which  makes 
all  of  them  real  and  actual,  viz.  the  concept  of  Actuality  or 
Actual  Reality  itself. 

Hegel  and  his  followers  have  involved  themselves  in  a  pantheistic  philo- 
sophy by  neglecting  to  distinguish  between  those  two  totally  different  con- 
cepts.2 A  similar  error  has  also  resulted  from  failure  to  distinguish  between 

1 "  Esse  actum  quemdam  nominat :  non  enim  dicitur  esse  aliquid  ex  hoc,  quod 
est  in  potentia,  sed  ex  hoc,  quod  est  in  actu." — ST.  THOMAS,  Contra  Gent.  I.,  c. 
xxii.,  4. 

2  Certain  medieval  philosophers  had  made  the  same  mistake.  St.  Thomas 
points  out  their  error  frequently.  C/.  Contra  Gentes,  i.,  c.  xxvi :  "  Quia  id,  quod 
commune  est,  per  additionem  specificatur  vel  individuatur,  aestimaverunt,  divinum 
esse,  cui  nulla  fit  additio,  non  esse  aliquid  proprium,  sed  esse  commune  omnium  : 
non  considerantes,  quod  id,  quod  commune  est,  vel  universale,  sine  additione  esse 
non  potest,  sed  sine  additione  consideratur.  Non  enim  animal  potest  esse  absque 
rationali  vel  irrationali  differentia,  quamvis  sine  his  differentiis  consideretur ;  licet 
enim  cogitetur  universale  absque  additione,  non  tamen  absque  receptibilitate 
additionis  est.  Nam  si  animali  nulla  differentia  addi  posset,  genus  non  esset ;  et 
similiter  est  de  omnibus  aliis  nominibus.  Divinum  autem  esse  est  absque  additione, 
non  solum  cogitatione,  sed  etiam  in  rerum  natura ;  et  non  solum  absque  additione, 
sed  absque  receptibilitate  additionis.  Unde  ex  hoc  ipso  quod  additionem  non 
recipit,  nee  recipere  potest,  magis  concludi  potest  quod  Deus  non  sit  esse  commune, 
sed  esse  proprium.  Etenim  ex  hoc  ipso  suum  esse  ab  omnibus  aliis  distinguitur, 
quia  nihil  ei  addi  potest." 

4 


50  ONTOLOGY 

the  various  modes  in  which  being  that  is  relative  may  be  dependent!  on  being 
that  is  absolute.  God  is  the  Absolute  Being ;  creatures  are  relative.  So 
too  is  substance  absolute  being,  compared  with  accidents  as  inhering  and 
existing  in  substance.  But  God  is  not  therefore  to  be  conceived  as  the  one 
all-pervading  substance,  of  which  all  finite  things,  all  phenomena,  would  be 
only  accidental  manifestations. 


CHAPTER  II. 

BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS. 

6.  THE  STATIC  AND  THE  CHANGING.— The  things  we  see 
around  us,  the  things  which  make  up  the  immediate  data  of  our 
experience,  not  only  are  or  exist ;  they  also  become,  or  come  into 
actual  existence ;  they  change  ;  they  pass  out  of  actual  existence. 
The  abstract  notion  of  being  represents  its  object  to  the  mind  in 
a  static,  permanent,  changeless,  self-identical  condition ;  but  if 
this  condition  were  an  adequate  representation  of  reality  change 
would  be  unreal,  would  be  only  an  illusion.  This  is  what  the 
Eleatic  philosophers  of  ancient  Greece  believed,  distinguishing 
merely  between  being  and  nothingness.  But  they  were  mistaken  ; 
for  change  in  things  is  too  obviously  real  to  be  eliminated  by 
calling  it  an  illusion :  even  if  it  were  an  illusion,  this  illusion  at 
least  would  have  to  be  accounted  for.  In  order,  therefore,  to 
understand  reality  we  must  employ  not  merely  the  notion  of 
being  (something  static),  but  also  the  notion  of  becoming,  change, 
process,  appearing  and  disappearing  (something  kinetic,  and 
something  dynamic).  In  doing  so,  however,  we  must  not  fall 
into  the  error  of  the  opposite  extreme  from  the  Eleatics — by 
regarding  change  as  the  adequate  representation  of  reality.  This 
is  what  Heraclitus  and  the  later  lonians  did :  holding  that 
nothing  is,  that  all  becomes  (Trdvra  pet),  that  change  is  all  reality, 
that  the  stable,  the  permanent,  is  non-existent,  unreal,  an  illusion. 
This  too  is  false ;  for  change  would  be  unintelligible  without  at 
least  an  abiding  law  of  change,  a  permanent  principle  of  some 
sort ;  which,  in  turn,  involves  the  reality  of  some  sort  of  abiding, 
stable,  permanent  being. 

We  must  then — with  Aristotle,  as  against  both  of  those  one- 
sided conceptions — hold  to  the  reality  both  of  being  and  of 
becoming ;  and  proceed  to  see  how  the  stable  ^and  the  changing 
can  both  be  real. 

To  convince  ourselves  that  they  are  both  real,  very  little 

51  4* 


52  ONTOLOGY 

reflection  is  needed.  We  have  actual  experience  of  both  those 
elements  of  reality  in  our  consciousness  and  memory  of  our  own 
selves.  Every  human  individual  in  the  enjoyment  of  his  mental 
faculties  knows  himself  as  an  abiding,  self-identical  being,  yet  as 
constantly  undergoing  real  changes ;  so  that  throughout  his  life 
he  is  really  the  same  being,  though  just  as  certainly  he  really 
changes.  In  external  nature,  too,  we  observe  on  the  one  hand 
innumerable  processes  of  growth  and  decay,  of  motion  and 
interaction ;  and  on  the  other  hand  a  similarly  all-pervading 
element  of  sameness  or  identity  amid  all  this  never-ending  change. 

7.  THE  POTENTIAL  AND  THE  ACTUAL,  (a)  POSSIBILITY, 
ABSOLUTE,  RELATIVE,  AND  ADEQUATE. — It  is  from  our  experi- 
ence of  actuality  and  change  that  we  derive  not  only  our  notion 
of  temporal  duration,  but  also  our  notion  of  potential  being  or 
possibility ',  as  distinct  from  that  of  actual  being  or  actuality.  It 
is  from  our  experience  of  what  actually  exists  that  we  are  able  to 
determine  what  can,  and  what  cannot  exist.  We  know  from  ex- 
perience what  gold  is,  and  what  a  tower  is  ;  and  that  it  is  intrin- 
sically possible  for  a  golden  tower  to  exist,  that  such  an  object 
of  thought  involves  no  contradiction,  that  therefore  its  existence 
is  not  impossible,  even  though  it  may  never  actually  exist  as  a 
fact.  Similarly,  we  know  from  experience  what  a  square  is,  and 
what  a  circle  is ;  and  that  it  is  intrinsically  impossible  for  a  square 
circle  to  exist,  that  such  an  object  of  thought  involves  a  contra- 
diction, that  therefore  not  only  is  such  an  object  never  actually 
existent  in  fact,  but  that  it  is  in  no  sense  real,  in  no  way  possible. 

Thus,  intrinsic  (or  objective^  absolute,  logical,  metaphysical} 
possibility  is  the  mere  non-repugnance  of  an  object  of  thought  to 
actual  existence.  Any  being  or  object  of  thought  that  is  con- 
ceivable in  this  way,  that  can  be  conceived  as  capable  of  actually 
existing,  is  called  intrinsically  (or  objectively,  absolutely,  logically, 
metaphysically)  possible  being.  The  absence  of  such  intrinsic 
capability  of  actual  existence  gives  us  the  notion  of  the  intrinsi- 
cally (objectively,  absolutely,  logically,  metaphysically)  impos- 
sible. We  shall  return  to  these  notions  again.  They  are 
necessary  here  for  the  understanding  of  real  change  in  the  actual 
universe. 

Fixing  our  attention  now  upon  the  real  changes  which  char- 
acterize the  data  of  our  experience,  let  us  inquire  what  conditions 
are  necessary  in  order  that  an  intrinsically  possible  object  of 
thought  become  here  and  now  an  actual  being.  It  matters  not 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  53 

whether  we  select  an  example  from  the  domain  of  organic  nature, 
of  inorganic  nature,  or  of  art — whether  it  be  an  oak,  or  an  ice- 
berg, or  a  statue.  In  order  that  there  be  here  and  now  an  actual 
oak-tree,  it  is  necessary  not  only  (i)  that  such  an  object  be  in- 
trinsically possible,  but  (2)  that  there  have  been  planted  here  an 
actual  acorn,  i.e.  an  actual  being  having  in  it  subjectively  and 
really  the  passive  potentiality  of  developing  into  an  actual  oak- 
tree,  and  (3)  that  there  be  in  the  actual  things  around  the  acorn 
active  powers  or  forces  capable  of  so  influencing  the  latent,  passive 
potentiality  of  the  acorn  as  gradually  to  evolve  the  oak-tree  there- 
from. So,  too,  for  the  (i)  intrinsically  possible  iceberg,  there  are 
needed  (2)  water  capable  of  becoming  ice,  and  (3)  natural  powers 
or  forces  capable  of  forming  it  into  ice  and  setting  this  adrift  in 
the  ocean.  And  for  the  (i)  intrinsically  possible  statue  there  are 
needed  (2)  the  block  of  marble  or  other  material  capable  of  be- 
coming a  statue,  and  (3)  the  sculptor  having  the  power  to  mould 
this  material  into  an  actual  statue. 

In  order,  therefore,  that  a  thing  which  is  not  now  actual,  but 
only  intrinsically  or  absolutely  possible,  become  actual,  there 
must  actually  exist  some  being  or  beings  endowed  with  the  active 
power  or  potency  of  making  this  possible  thing  actual.  The  latter 
is  then  said  to  be  relatively -,  extrinsically  possible — in  relation  to 
such  being  or  beings.  And  obviously  a  thing  may  be  possible 
relatively  to  the  power  of  one  being,  and  not  possible  relatively 
to  lesser  power  of  another  being  :  the  statue, that  is  intrinsically 
possible  in  the  block  of  marble,  may  >be  extrinsically  possible 
relatively  to  the  skilled  sculptor,  but  not  relatively  to  the  unskilled 
person  who  is  not  a  sculptor. 

Furthermore,  relatively  to  the  same  agent  or  agents,  the  pro- 
duction of  a  given  effect,  the  doing  of  a  given  thing,  is  said  to  be 
physically  possible  if  it  can  be  brought  about  by  such  agents  act- 
ing according  to  the  ordinary  course  of  nature  ;  \  if,  in  other  words 
they  have  the  physical  power  to  do  it.  Otherwise  it  is  said  to 
be  physically  impossible,  even  though  metaphysically  or  intrinsic- 
ally possible,  e.g.  it  is  physically  impossible  for  a  dead  person  to 
come  to  life  again.  A  thing  is  said  to  be  morally  possible,  in 
reference  to  free  and  responsible  agents,  if  they  can  do  it  without 
unreasonable  inconvenience  ;  otherwise  it  is  considered  as  morally 
impossible,  even  though  it  be  both  physically  and  metaphysically 
possible  :  as  often  happens  in  regard  to  the  fulfilment  of  one's 
obligations. 


54  ONTOLOGY 

That  which  is  both  intrinsically  and  extrinsically  possible  is  said 
to  be  adequately  possible.  Whatever  is  intrinsically  possible  is 
also  extrinsically  possible  in  relation  to  God,  who  is  Almighty, 
Omnipotent. 

8.  (£)  SUBJECTIVE  "POTENTIA,"  ACTIVE  AND  PASSIVE.— 
Furthermore,  we  conceive  the  Infinite  Being,  Almighty  God,  as 
capable  of  creating,  or  producing  actual  being  from  nothingness,  i.e. 
without  any  actually  pre-existing  material  out  of  whose  passive 
potentiality  the  actual  being  would  be  developed.  Creative 
power  or  activity  does  not  need  any  pre-existing  subject  on  which 
to  exercise  its  influence,  any  subject  in  whose  passive  potenti- 
ality the  thing  to  be  created  is  antecedently  implicit. 

But  all  other  power,  all  activity  of  created  causes,  does 
require  some  such  actually  existing  subject.  If  we  examine 
the  activities  of  the  agencies  that  fall  within  our  direct  experi- 
ence, whether  in  external  nature  or  in  our  own  selves,  we  shall 
find  that  in  no  case  does  their  operative  influence  or  causality 
extend  beyond  the  production  of  changes  in  existing  being,  or 
attain  to  the  production  of  new  actual  being  out  of  nothingness. 
The  forces  of  nature  cannot  produce  an  oak  without  an  acorn, 
or  an  iceberg  without  water ;  nor  can  the  sculptor  produce  a 
statue  except  from  some  pre-existing  material. 

The  natural  passive  potentiality  of  things  is,  moreover,  limited  in  refer- 
ence to  the  active  powers  of  the  created  universe.  These,  for  example,  can 
educe  life  from  the  passive  potentiality  of  inorganic  matter,  but  only  by 
assimilating  this  matter  into  a  living  organism  :  they  cannot  restore  life  to  a 
human  corpse  ;  yet  the  latter  has  in  it  the  capacity  to  be  restored  to  life  by 
the  direct  influence  of  the  Author  of  Nature.  This  special  and  supernatural 
potentiality  in  created  things,  under  the  influence  of  Omnipotence,  is  known 
as  potentia  obedientalis?' 

This  consideration  will  help  us  to  realize  that  all  reality 
which  is  produced  by  change,  and  subject  to  change,  is  essenti- 
ally a  mixture  of  becoming  and  being,  of  potential  and  actual. 
The  reality  of  such  being  is  not  tota  simul.  Only  immutable 
being,  whose  duration  is  eternal,  has  its  reality  tota  simul:  it 
alone  is  purely  actual,  the  "  Actus  Purus"  ;  and  its  duration  is 
one  eternal  "  now,"  without  beginning,  end,  or  succession.  But 
mutable  being,  whose  duration  in  actual  existence  is  measured 
by  time,  is  actualized  only  successively :  its  actuality  at  any  par- 
ticular instant  does  not  embody  the  whole  of  its  reality  :  this 

1  Cf.  ST.  THOMAS,  QQ.  DD.  De  Potentia,  q.  i.  art.  i,  ad.  18. 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  55 

latter  includes  also  a  "  was  "  and  "  will  be  "  ;  the  thing  was 
potentially  what  it  now  is  actually,  and  it  will  become  actually 
something  which  it  now  is  only  potentially  ;  nor  shall  we  have 
understood  even  moderately  the  nature  or  essence  of  any  mutable 
being — an  oak-tree,  for  example — until  we  have  grasped  the  fact 
that  the  whole  reality  of  its  nature  embraces  more  than  what  we 
find  of  it  actually  existing  at  any  given  instant  of  its  existence. 
In  other  words,  we  have  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  reality  of  such 
a  being  is  not  pure  actuality  but  a  mixture  of  potential  and 
actual  :  that  it  is  an  actus  non-purus,  or  an  actus  mixtus. 

We  have  to  note  well  that  the  potential  being  of  a  thing  is 
something  real — that  it  is  not  merely  a  modus  loquendi,  or  a 
modus  intelligendi.  The  oak  is  in  the  acorn  in  some  true  and 
real  sense :  the  potentiality  of  the  oak  is  something  real  in  the 
acorn :  if  it  were  not  so,  if  it  were  nothing  real  in  the  acorn,  we 
could  say  with  equal  truth  that  a  man  or  a  horse  or  a  house  is 
potentially  in  the  acorn  ;  or,  again  with  equal  truth,  that  the 
oak  is  potentially  in  a  mustard-seed,  or  a  grain  of  corn,  or  a 
pebble,  or  a  drop  of  water.  Therefore  the  oak  is  really  in  the 
acorn — not  actually  but  potentially, potentia passiva. 

The  oak-tree  is  also  really  in  those  active  forces  of  nature 
whose  influence  on  the  acorn  develop  the  latter  into  an  actual 
oak-tree  :  it  is  in  those  causes  not  actually,  of  course,  but  virtu- 
ally, for  they  possess  in  themselves  the  operative  power — potentia 
activa  sive  operativa — to  educe  the  oak-tree  out  of  the  acorn. 
These  two  potential  conditions  of  a  being — in  the  active  causes 
which  produce  it,  and  in  the  pre-existing  actual  thing  or  things 
from  which  it  is  produced — are  called  each  a  real  or  subjective 
potency,  potentia  realis,  or  potentia  subjectiva,  in  distinction  from 
the  mere  logical  or  objective  possibility  of  such  a  being. 

And  just  as  the  passive  potentiality  of  the  statue  is  something 
real  in  the  block  of  marble,  though  distinct  from  the  actuality  of 
the  statue  and  from  the  process  by  which  this  is  actualized,  so  is 
the  active  power  of  making  the  statue  something  real  in  the 
sculptor,  though  distinct  from  the  operation  by  which  he  makes 
the  statue.  If  an  agent's  power  to  act,  to  produce  change,  were 
not  a  reality  in  the  agent,  a  reality  distinct  from  the  action  of  the 
latter ;  or  if  a  being's  capacity  to  undergo  change,  and  thereby 
to  become  something  other,  were  not  a  reality  distinct  from  the 
process  of  change,  and  from  the  actual  result  of  this  process 
— it  would  follow  not  only  that  the  actual  alone  is  real,  and 


56  ONTOLOGY 

the  merely  possible  or  potential  unreal,  but  also  that  no  change 
can  be  real,  that  nothing  can  really  become,  and  nothing  really 
disappear.1 

9.  (V)  ACTUALITY:  ITS  RELATION  TO  POTENTIALITY.— It 
is  from  our  experience  of  change  in  the  world  that  we  derive  our 
notions  of  the  potential  and  the  actual,  of  active  power  and 
passive  potentiality.  The  term  "  act "  has  primarily  the  same 
meaning  as  " action,"  "operation,"  that  process  by  which  a 
change  is  wrought.  But  the  Latin  word  actus  (Gr.  evepyeia, 
€VT6\€%ei,a)  means  rather  that  which  is  achieved  by  the  actio, 
that  which  is  the  correlative  and  complement  of  the  passive 
potentiality,  the  actuality  of  this  latter :  that  by  which  potential 
being  is  rendered  formally  actual,  and,  by  way  of  consequence, 
this  actual  being  itself.  " Potentia  activa"  and  its  correlative 
"actus"  might,  perhaps,  be  appropriately  rendered  by  "power" 
(potestas  agendi)  and  "  action  "  or  "  operation  "  ;  "potentia  passiva  " 
and  its  correlative  "actus"  by  "potentiality"  and  "actuality" 
respectively. 

In  these  correlatives,  the  notion  underlying  the  term  "  actual  " 
is  manifestly  the  notion  of  something  completed,  achieved, 
perfected — as  compared  with  that  of  something  incomplete,  im- 
perfect, determinable,  which  is  the  notion  of  the  potential. 
Hence  the  notions  of  potentia  and  actus  have  been  extended 
widely  beyond  their  primary  signification  of  power  to  act  and  the 
exercise  of  this  power.  Such  pairs  of  correlatives  as  the  deter- 
minable and  the  determined,  the  perfectible  and  the  perfected, 
the  undeveloped  or  less  developed  and  the  more  developed,  the 
generic  and  the  specific,  are  all  conceived  under  the  aspect  of 
this  widest  relation  of  the  potential  to  the  actual.  And  since 
we  can  distinguish  successive  stages  in  any  process  of  develop- 
ment, or  an  order  of  logical  sequence  among  the  contents  of  our 
concept  of  any  concrete  reality,  it  follows  that  what  will  be  con- 
ceived as  an  actus  in  one  relation  will  be  conceived  as  a  potentia 
in  another.  Thus,  the  disposition  of  any  faculty — as,  for  example, 
the  scientific  habit  in  the  intellect — is  an  actus  or  perfection  of 
the  faculty  regarded  as  a  potentia ;  but  it  is  itself  a  potentia 
which  is  actualized  in  the  operation  of  actually  studying.  This 
illustrates  the  distinction  commonly  drawn  between  an  "actus 
qrimus"  and  an  "  actus  secundus"  in  any  particular  order  or  line 
of  reality:  the  actus  primus  is  that  which  presupposes  no  prior 

1  ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.,  c.  iv.,  v.,  apud  KLEUTQEN,  op.  cit.,  iii.,'p.  60. 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  57 

actuality  in  the  same  order;  the  actus  secundus  is  that  which 
does  presuppose  another.  The  act  of  knowing  is  an  actus  secun- 
dus which  presupposes  the  cognitive  faculty  as  an  actus  primus : 
the  faculty  being  the  first  or  fundamental  equipment  of  the  soul 
in  relation  to  knowledge.  Hence  the  child  is  said  to  have  know- 
ledge "in  actu  primo"  as  having  the  faculty  of  reason;  and  the 
student  to  have  knowledge  "  in  actu  secundo "  as  exercising  this 
faculty. 

The  actus  or  perfecting  principles  of  which  we  have  spoken 
so  far  are  all  conceived  as  presupposing  an  existing  subject  on 
which  they  supervene^,,  They  are  therefore  accidents  as  distinct 
from  substantial  constitive  principles  of  this  subject ;  and  they 
are  therefore  called  accidental  actualities,  actus  "  accidentales" . 
But  the  actual  existence  of  a  being  is  also  conceived  as  the  com- 
plement and  correlative  of  its  essence :  as  that  which  makes  the 
latter  actual,  thus  transferring  it  from  the  state  of  mere  possi- 
bility. Hence  existence  also  is  called  an  actus  or  actuality:  the 
actus  "existentialist  to  distinguish  it  from  the  existing  thing's 
activities  and  other  subsequently  acquired  characters.  In 
reference  to  these  existence  is  a  "  first  actuality  " — "  Esse  est  actus 
primus"  ;  " Prius  est  esse  quant  agere"  :  "Existence  is  the  first 
actuality  "  ;  "  Action  presupposes  existence  " — while  each  of  these 
in  reference  to  existence,  is  a  "  second  actuality,"  an  actus  secundus. 
When,  furthermore,  we  proceed  to  examine  the  constitutive 
principles  essential  to  any  being  in  the  concrete,  we  may  be  able 
to  distinguish  between  principles  which  are  determinable,  pas- 
sive and  persistent  throughout  all  essential  change  of  that  being, 
and  others  which  are  determining,  specifying,  differentiating 
principles.  In  water,  for  example,  we  may  distinguish  the 
passive  underlying  principle  which  persists  throughout  the 
decomposition  of  water  into  oxygen  and  hydrogen,  from  the 
active  specifying  principle  which  gives  that  substratum  its 
specific  nature  as  water.  The  former  or  material  principle  (v\ij, 
materia)  is  potential,  compared  with  the  latter  or  formal  principle 
(fjLoptytf,  eZSo?,  evT6\ex€ia,  forma,  species,  actus}  as  actual. 
The  concept  of  actus  is  thus  applied  to  the  essence  itself:  the 
actus  "  essentialis"  or  "formalis"  of  a  thing  is  that  which  we 
conceive  to  be  the  ultimate,  completing  and  determining  principle 
of  the  essence  or  nature  of  that  thing.  In  reference  to  this  as 
well  as  the  other  constitutive  principles  of  the  thing,  the  actual 
existence  of  the  thing  is  a  "  second  actuality,"  an  actus  secundus. 


58  ONTOLOGY 

In  fact  all  the  constitutive  principles  of  the  essence  of  any  ex- 
isting thing,  and  all  the  properties  and  attributes  involved  in  the 
essence  or  necessarily  connected  with  the  essence,  must  all  alike 
be  conceived  as  logically  antecedent  to  the  existential  actus 
whereby  they  are  constituted  something  in  the  actual  order,  and 
not  mere  possible  objects  of  our  thought.  And  from  this  point 
of  view  the  existence  of  a  thing  is  called  the  ultimate  actualization 
of  its  essence.  Hence  the  scholastic  aphorism:  " Esse  est 
ultimus  actus  rei  ". 

The  term  actus  may  designate  that  complement  of  reality  by 
which  potential  being  is  made  actual  (actus  "  actuans"\  or  this 
actual  being  itself  (actus  "  simpliciter  dictus  ").  In  the  latter  sense 
we  have  already  distinguished  the  Being  that  is  immutable,  the 
Being  of  God,  as  the  Actus  Purus,  from  the  being  of  all  mutable 
things,  which  latter  being  is  necessarily  a  mixture  of  potential 
and  actual,  an  actus  mixtus. 

Now  if  the  essences  of  corporeal  things  are  composite,  if  they 
are  constituted  by  the  union  of  some  determining,  formative 
principle  with  a  determinable,  passive  principle — of  "  form  "  with 
"  matter,"  in  scholastic  terminology — we  may  call  these  formative 
principles  actus  "  informantes"  >;  and  if  these  cannot  actually 
exist  except  in  union  with  a  material  principle  they  may  be 
called  actus  "  non-sub sistentes "  ;  e.g.,  the  formative  principle  or 
" Jorma  substantiate"  of  water,  or  the  vital  principle  of  a  plant. 
If,  on  the  other  hand,  there  exist  essences  which,  being  simple, 
do  not  actualize  any  material,  determinable  principle,  but  subsist 
independently  of  any  such,  they  are  called  actus  "  non-informantes" 
or  actus  "  subsistentes ".  Such,  for  example,  are  God,  and  pure 
spirits  whose  existence  is  known  from  revelation.  Finally,  there 
may  be  a  kind  of  actual  essence  which,  though  it  naturally  actual- 
izes a  material  principle  de  facto,  can  nevertheless  continue  to 
subsist  without  this  latter  :  such  an  actual  being  would  be  at 
once  an  actus  informans  and  an  actus  subsistens ;  and  such,  in 
fact,  is  the  human  soul. 

Throughout  all  distinctions  between  the  potential  and  the 
actual  there  runs  the  conception  of  the  actual  as  something  more 
perfect  than  the  potential.  There  is  in  the  actual  something  posi- 
tive and  real  over  and  above  what  is  in  the  potential.  This  is  an 
ultimate  fact  in  our  analysis  ;  and  its  importance  will  be  realized 
when  we  come  to  apply  the  notions  we  have  been  explaining  to 
the  study  of  change. 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  59 

The  notion  of  grades  of  perfection  in  things  is  one  with 
which  everyone  is  familiar.  We  naturally  conceive  some  beings 
as  higher  upon  the  scale  of  reality  than  others  ;  as  having  "  more" 
reality,  so  to  speak — not  necessarily,  of  course,  in  the  literal  sense 
of  size  or  quantity — than  others  ;  as  being  more  perfect,  nobler, 
of  greater  worth,  value,  dignity,  excellence,  than  others.  Thus 
we  regard  the  infinite  as  more  perfect  than  the  finite,  spiritual 
beings  as  nobler  than  material  beings,  man  as  a  higher  order  of 
being  than  the  brute  beast,  this  again  as  surpassing  the  whole 
vegetable  kingdom,  the  lowest  form  of  life  as  higher  on  the  scale 
of  being  than  inorganic  matter,  the  substance-mode  of  being  as 
superior  to  all  accident-modes,  the  actualized  state  of  a  being 
as  more  perfect  than  its  potential  state,  i.e.  as  existing  in  its 
material,  efficient  and  ideal  or  exemplar  causes.  The  grounds 
and  significance  of  this  mental  appreciation  of  relative  values  in 
things  must  be  discussed  elsewhere.  We  refer  to  it  here  in  order 
to  point  out  another  scholastic  aphorism,  according  to  which  the 
higher  a  thing  is  in  the  scale  of  actual  being,  and  the  more  perfect 
it  is  accordingly,  the  more  efficient  it  will  also  be  as  a  principle 
of  action,  the  more  powerful  as  a  cause  in  the  production  of 
changes  in  other  things,  the  more  operative  in  actualizing  their 
passive  potentialities  ;  and  conversely,  the  less  actual  a  thing  is, 
and  therefore  the  more  imperfect,  the  greater  its  passive  capacity 
will  be  to  undergo  the  influence  of  agencies  that  are  actual  and 
operative  around  it.  "  As  passive  potentiality,"  says  St.  Thomas,1 
"  is  the  mark  of  potential  being,  so  active  power  is  the  mark  of 
actual  being.  For  a  thing  acts,  in  so  far  as  it  is  actual ;  but  is 
acted  on,  so  far  as  it  is  potential."  Our  knowledge  of  the  nature 
of  things  is  in  fact  exclusively  based  on  our  knowledge  of  their 
activities  :  we  have  no  other  key  to  the  knowledge  of  what  a 
thing  is  than  our  knowledge  of  what  it  does  :  "  Operari  sequitur 
essen  :  "  Qualis  est  operatic  talis  est  natura" — "  Acting  follows 
being  "  :  "  Conduct  is  the  key  to  nature ". 

A  being  that  is  active  or  operative  in  the  production  of  a 
change  is  said  to  be  the  efficient  cause  of  the  change,  the  latter 
being  termed  the  effect.  Now  the  greater  the  change,  i.e.  the 
higher  and  more  perfect  be  the  grade  of  reality  that  is  actualized 
in  the  change,  the  higher  too  in  the  scale  of  being  must  be  the 
efficient  cause  of  that  change.  There  must  be  a  proportion  in 
degree  of  perfection  or  reality  between  effect  and  cause.  The 
1  Contra  Gentes,  II.,  c.  vii. 


60  ONTOLOGY 

former  cannot  exceed  in  actual  perfection  the  active  power,  and 
therefore  the  actual  being,  of  the  latter.  This  is  so  because  we 
conceive  the  effect  as  being  produced  or  actualized  through  the 
operative  influence  of  the  cause,  and  with  real  dependence  on  this 
latter  ;  and  it  is  inconceivable  that  a  cause  should  have  power  to 
actualize  other  being,  distinct  from  itself,  which  would  be  of  a 
higher  grade  of  excellence  than  itself.  The  nature  of  efficient 
causality,  of  the  influence  by  which  the  cause  is  related  to  its 
effect,  is  not  easy  to  determine  ;  it  will  be  discussed  at  a  subse- 
quent stage  of  our  investigations  (ch.  XL) ;  but  whatever  it  be,  a 
little  reflection  should  convince  us  of  the  truth  of  the  principle 
just  stated  :  that  an  effect  cannot  be  more  perfect  than  its  cause. 
The  mediaeval  scholastics  embodied  this  truth  in  the  formula  : 
Nemo  dat  quod  non  habet — a  formula  which  we  must  not  interpret 
in  the  more  restricted  and  literal  sense  of  the  words  giving  and 
having,  lest  we  be  met  with  the  obvious  objection  that  it  is  by 
no  means  necessary  for  a  boy  to  have  a  black  eye  himself  in 
order  to  give  one  to  his  neighbour !  What  the  formula  means 
is  that  an  agent  cannot  give  to,  or  produce  in,  any  potential 
subject,  receptive  of  its  causal  influence,  an  actuality  which  it 
does  not  itself  possess  virtually,  or  in  its  active  power  :  that  no 
actuality  surpassing  in  excellence  the  actual  perfection  of  the 
cause  itself  can  be  found  thus  virtually  in  the  active  power  of  the 
latter.  There  is  no  question  of  the  cause  or  agent  transferring 
bodily  as  it  were  a  part  of  its  own  actuality  to  the  subject  which 
is  undergoing  change  x  ;  nor  will  such  crude  imagination  images 
help  us  to  understand  what  real  change,  under  the  influence  of 
efficient  causality,  involves.2  An  analysis  of  change  will  enable 
us  to  appreciate  more  fully  the  real  difficulty  of  explaining  it, 
and  the  futility  of  any  attempt  to  account  for  it  without  admitting 
the  real,  objective  validity  of  the  notions  of  actual  and  potential 
being,  of  active  powers  or  forces  and  passive  potentialities  in  the 
things  that  are  subject  to  change. 

1  C/.  LAMINNE,  Cause  et  Effet — Revue  neo-scolastique,  February,  1914,  p.  38. 

2  St.  Thomas  uses  what  is  for  him  strong  language  when  he  describes  such  a 
view  as  ridiculous  :  "  Ridiculum  est  dicere  quod  ideo  corpus  non  agat,  quia  accidens 
non  transit  de  subjecto  in  subjectum  ;  non  enim  hoc  modo  dicitur  corpus  calidum 
calefacere,  quod  idem   numero  calor,  qui  est  in  calefaciente  corpore,  transeat  ad 
corpus  ,calefactum  ;  sed  quia  virtute  caloris,  qui  est  in  calefaciente  corpore,  alius 
calor  numero  fit  actu  in  corpore  calefacto,  qui  prior  erat  in  eo  in  potentia.     Agens 
enim  naturale  non  est  traducens  propriam  formam  in  alterum  subjectum,  sed  re- 
ducens  subjectum  quod  patitur  de  potentia  in  actum." — Contra  Gentes,  L.  III.,  c, 
Ixix. 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  61 

10.  ANALYSIS  OF  CHANGE.  —  Change  (Mutatio,  Motus, 
ij,  /civrja-is;)  is  one  of  those  simplest  concepts  which  cannot 
be  defined.  We  may  describe  it,  however,  as  the  transition  of  a 
being  front  one  state  to  another.  If  one  thing  entirely  disappeared 
and  another  were  substituted  for  it,  we  should  not  regard  the 
former  as  having  been  changed  into  the  latter.  When  one 
thing  is  put  in  the  place  of  another,  each,  no  doubt,  undergoes  a 
change  of  place,  but  neither  is  changed  into  the  other.  So,  also, 
if  we  were  to  conceive  a  thing  as  absolutely  ceasing  to  exist,  as 
lapsing  into  nothingness  at  a  given  instant,  and  another  as  coming 
into  existence  out  of  nothingness  at  the  same  instant  (and  in  the 
same  place),  we  should  not  consider  this  double  event  as  consti- 
tuting a  real  change  of  the  former  thing  into  the  latter.  And 
although  our  senses  cannot  testify  to  anything  beyond  sequence  in 
sense  phenomena,  our  reason  detects  in  real  change  something  other 
than  a  total  substitution  of  things  for  one  another,  or  continuous 
total  cessations  and  inceptions  of  existence  in  things.  No  doubt, 
if  we  conceive  the  whole  phenomenal  or  perceptible  universe  and  all 
the  beings  which  constitute  this  universe  as  essentially  contingent, 
and  therefore  dependent  for  their  reality  and  their  actual  existence 
on  a  Supreme,  Necessary  Being  who  created  and  conserves  them, 
who  at  any  time  may  cease  to  conserve  any  of  them,  and  pro- 
duce other  and  new  beings  out  of  nothingness,  then  such  absolute 
cessations  and  inceptions  of  existence  in  the  world  would  not  be 
impossible.  God  might  annihilate,  i.e.  cease  to  conserve  in  exis- 
tence, this  or  that  contingent  being  at  any  instant,  and  at  any 
instant  create  a  new  contingent  being,  i.e.  produce  it  in  its  totality 
from  no  pre-existing  material.  But  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose 
that  this  is  what  is  constantly  taking  place  in  Nature :  that  all 
change  is  simply  a  series  of  annihilations  and  creations.  On  the 
contrary,  the  modes  of  being  which  appear  and  disappear  in  real 
change,  in  the  transition  of  anything  from  one  state  to  a  really 
different  state  of  being,  do  not  appear  de  novo,  exmihilo,  as  absolute 
beginnings  out  of  nothingness  ;  or  disappear  totaliter,  in  nihilum, 
as  absolute  endings  or  lapses  of  reality  into  nothingness.  The 
real  changes  which  take  place  in  Nature  are  due  to  the  operation 
of  natural  causes.  These  causes,  being  finite  in  their  operative 
powers,  cannot  create,  i.e.  produce  new  being  from  nothingness. 
They  can,  however,  with  the  concurrence  of  the  Omnipotent 
Being,  modify  existing  modes  of  being,  i.e.  make  actual  what  was 
only  potential  in  these  latter.  The  notion  of  change  is  not 


62  ONTOLOGY 

verified  in  the  conception  of  successive  annihilations  and  creations ; 
for  there  is  involved  in  the  former  concept  not  merely  the  notion 
of  a  real  difference  between  the  two  actual  states,  that  before  and 
that  after  the  change,  but  also  the  notion  of  some  potential  reality 
persisting  throughout  the  change,  something  capable  of  being  actu- 
ally so  and  so  before  the  change  and  actually  otherwise  after  the 
change.  For  real  change,  therefore,  we  require  ( I )  two  positive  and 
really  different  states  of  the  same  being,  a  "  terminus  a  quo  "  and  a 
"  terminus  ad  quern  "  ;  and  (2)  a  real  process  of  transition  whereby 
something  potential  becomes  actual.  In  creation  there  is  no  real 
and  positive  terminus  a  quo  ;  in  annihilation  there  is  no  real  and 
positive  terminus  ad  quern ;  these  therefore  are  not  changes  in 
the  proper  sense  of  the  term.  Sometimes,  too,  change  is  affirmed, 
by  purely  extrinsic  denomination,  of  a  thing  in  which  there  is  no 
real  change,  but  only  a  relation  to  some  other  really  changing 
thing.  In  this  sense  when  an  object  unknown  or  unthought  of 
becomes  the  actual  object  of  somebody's  thought  or  cognition,  it 
is  said  to  " change,"  though  the  transition  from  "unknown"  to 
"known"  involves  no  real  change  of  state  in  the  object,  but  only 
in  the  knowing  subject.  If  thought  were  in  any  true  sense 
"  constitutive  "  of  reality,  as  many  modern  philosophers  contend, 
the  change  in  the  object  would  of  course  be  real. 

Since,  therefore,  change  consists  in  this,  that  a  thing  which 
is  actually  in  a  given  state  ceases  to  be  actually  such  and  begins 
to  be  actually  in  another  state,  it  is  obvious  that  there  persists 
throughout  the  process  some  reality  which  is  in  itself  potential 
and  indifferent  to  either  actual  state  ;  and  that,  moreover,  some- 
thing which  was  actual  disappears,  while  some  new  actuality 
appears,  in  this  persisting  potentiality.  The  abiding  potential 
principle  is  called  the  matter  or  subject  of  the  change;  the 
transient  actualizing  principles  are  called  forms.  Not  all  these 
"  forms "  which  precede  or  result  from  change  are  necessarily 
positive  entities  in  themselves :  they  may  be  mere  privations  of 
other  forms  ^privatio"  a-reprja^)  :  not  all  changes  result  in  the 
acquisition  of  a  new  degree  of  positive  actual  being ;  some  result 
in  loss  of  perfection  or  actuality.  Still,  even  in  these  cases,  the 
state  characterized  by  the  less  perfect  degree  of  actuality  has  a 
determinate  actual  grade  of  being  which  is  proper  to  itself,  and 
which,  as  such,  is  not  found  actually,  but  only  potentially,  in  the 
state  characterized  by  the  more  perfect  degree  of  actuality. 
When,  then,  a  being  changes  from  a  more  perfect  to  a  less 


s 
BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  63 

perfect  state,  the  actuality  of  this  less  perfect  state  cannot  be 
adequately  accounted  for  by  seeking  it  in  the  antecedent  and 
more  perfect  state :  it  is  not  in  this  latter  state  actually,  but  only 
potentially  ;  nor  do  we  account  for  it  by  saying  that  it  is  "equiva- 
lently "  in  the  greater  actuality  of  the  latter  state :  the  two 
actualizing  principles  are  really  distinct,  and  neither  is  wholly  or 
even  partially  the  other.  The  significance  of  this  consideration 
will  appear  presently  in  connection  with  the  scholastic  axiom  : 
Quidquid  movetur  ab  alio  movetur. 

Meanwhile  we  must  guard  against  conceiving  the  potential 
or  material  factor  in  change  as  a  sort  of  actual  but  hidden  core 
of  reality  which  itself  persists  unchanged  throughout ;  and  the 
formative  or  actualizing  factors  as  superficially  adorning  this 
substratum  by  constantly  replacing  one  another.  Such  a  sub- 
stitution of  imagination  images  for  intellectual  thought  will  not 
help,  but  rather  hinder,  all  accurate  analysis.  It  is  not  the 
potential  or  material  factor  in  things  that  changes,  nor  yet  the 
actualizing  or  formal  factors,  but  the  things  themselves ;  and  if 
"  things "  are  subject  to  "  real  change "  it  is  manifest  that  this 
fact  can  be  made  intelligible,  if  at  all,  only  by  intellectually 
analysing  the  things  and  their  changes  into  constitutive  principles 
or  factors  which  are  ndf" themselves  "things"  or  " changes". 
Were  we  to  arrive  only  at  principles  of  the  latter  sort,  so  far 
from  explaining  anything  we  would  really  only  have  pushed 
back  the  problem  a  step  farther.  It  may  be  that  none  of  the 
attempts  yet  made  by  philosophers  or  scientists  to  offer  an 
ultimate  explanation  of  change  is  entirely  satisfactory, — the 
scholastic  explanation  will  be  gradually  outlined  in  these  pages, 
—but  it  will  be  of  advantage  at  least  to  recognize  the  short- 
comings of  theories  that  are  certainly  inadequate. 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  state  and  explain  the  important 
scholastic  aphorism  embodying  what  has  been  called  the 
Principle  of  Change  ("  Principium  Motus  ")  :  Quidquid  movetur , 
ab  alio  movetur:  "Whatever  undergoes  change  is  changed  by 
something  else".  The  term  motus  is  here  taken  in  the  wide 
sense  of  any  real  transition  from  potentiality  to  actuality,  as  is 
evident  from  the  alternative  statements  of  the  same  principle : 
Nihil  potest  seipsum  reducer e  e  potentia  in  actum  :  "  Nothing  can 
reduce  itself  from  potentiality  to  actuality,"  or,  again,  Potentia, 
qua  talis,  nequit  per  semetipsam  ad  actum  reduci,  sed  reducitur  ab 
alio  principio  in  actu  :  "  The  potential  as  such  cannot  be  reduced 


64  ONTOLOGY 

by  itself  to  the  actual,  but  only  by  some  other  already  actual 
principle  "-1  This  assertion,  rightly  understood,  is  self-evidently 
true ;  for  the  state  of  passive  potentiality,  as  such,  involves  the 
absence  of  the  correlative  actuality  in  the  potential  subject ;  and 
since  the  actual,  as  such,  involves  a  perfection  which  is  not  in 
the  potential,  the  latter  cannot  confer  upon  itself  this  perfection  : 
nothing  can  be  the  adequate  principle  or  source  of  a  perfection 
which  is  not  in  this  principle  or  source  :  nemo  dat  quod  non  habet. 

We  have  already  anticipated' the  objection  arising  from  the 
consideration  that  the  state  resulting  from  a  change  is  sometimes 
in  its  totality  less  perfect  than  the  state  which  existed  prior  to 
the  change.  Even  in  such  cases  there  results  from  the  change  a 
new  actuality  which  was  not  in  the  prior  state,  and  which  cannot 
be  conceived  as  a  mere  part  or  residue  of  the  latter,  or  regarded 
as  equivalently  contained  in  the  latter.  Even  granting,  as  we 
must,  that  the  net  result  of  such  a  change  is  a  loss  of  actuality  or 
perfection  in  the  subject  of  change,  still  there  is  always  a  gain 
which  is  not  accounted  for  by  the  loss ;  there  is  always  a  new 
actual  state  which,  as  such,  was  not  in  the  original  state. 

A  more  obvious  objection  to  the  principle  arises  from  the 
consideration  of  vital  action  ;  but  it  is  based  on  a  misunderstand- 
ing of  the  principle  under  discussion.  Living  things,  it  is  objected, 
move  themselves  :  their  vital  action  is  spontaneous  and  immanent : 
originating  within  themselves,  it  has  its  term  too  within  them- 
selves, resulting  in  their  gradual  development,  growth,  increase 
of  actuality  and  perfection.  Therefore  it  would  appear  that  they 
move  and  perfect  themselves ;  and  hence  the  so-called  "  principle 
of  change  "  is  not  true  universally. 

In  reply  to  all  this  we  admit  that  vital  action  is  immanent, 
remaining  within  the  agent  to  perfect  the  latter  ;  also  that  it  is 
spontaneous,  inasmuch  as  when  the  agent  is  actually  exercising 
vital  functions  it  need  not  be  actually  undergoing  the  causal 
influence  of  any  other  created  agent,  or  actually  dependent  on 
any  such  agent.  But  it  must,  nevertheless,  in  such  action,  be 
dependent  on,  and  influenced  by,  some  actual  being  other  than 
itself.  And  the  reason  is  obvious  :  If  by  such  action  it  increases 

lCf.  ZIGLIARA,  Ontologia  (8),  ix.,  Quintum.  Cf.  also  ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.  v., 
ST.  THOMAS,  In  Metaph.,  v.,  §  14,  and  Contra  Gentes,  i.,  c.  xvi.,  where  he 
emphasizes  the  truth  that  potential  being  presupposes  actual  being:  "  Quamvis  id 
quod  quandoque  est  in  potentia,  quandoque  in  actu,  prius  sit  tempore  in  potentia 
quam  in  actu,  tamen  simpliciter  actus  est  prior  potentia ;  quia  potentia  non  educit 
se  in  actum,  sed  opportet  quod  educatur  in  actum  per  aliquid  quod  sit  in  actu. 
Omnc  igitur  quod  est  aliquo  modo  in  potentia,  habet  aliquid  prius  se  ". 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  65 

its  own  actual  perfection,  and  becomes  actually  other  than  it  was 
before  such  action,  then  it  cannot  have  given  itself  the  actuality 
of  this  perfection,  which  it  possessed  before  only  potentially.  No 
doubt,  it  is  not  merely  passively  potential  in  regard  to  such  actual 
perfections,  as  is  the  case  in  non-vital  change  which  results  in  the 
subject  from  the  transitive  action  of  some  outside  cause  upon  the 
latter.  The  living  thing  has  the  active  power  of  causing  or  pro- 
ducing in  itself  these  actual  perfections :  there  is  interaction 
between  its  vital  parts  :  through  one  organ  or  faculty  it  acts  upon 
another,  thus  educing  an  actuality,  a  new  perfection,  in  this 
other,  and  thus  developing  and  perfecting  its  own  being.  But 
even  considered  as  active  it  cannot  be  the  adequate  cause  of  the 
actuality  acquired  through  the  change.  If  this  actuality  is  some- 
thing really  over  and  above  the  reality  of  its  active  and  passive 
potential  principles,  then  it  remains  true  that  change  implies  the 
influence  of  an  actual  being  other  than  the  subject  changed  :  Quid 
quid  movetur^  ab  alio  movetur. 

The  question  here  arises,  not  only  in  reference  to  vital  agents,  but  to  all 
finite,  created  causes :  Does  the  active  cause  of  change  (together  with  the 
passive  potentiality  of  the  subject  of  change,  whether  this  subject  be  the 
agent  itself  as  in  immanent  activity,  or  something  other  than  the  agent  as  in 
transitive  activity), — does  this  active  power  account  adequately  for  the  new 
actuality  educed  in  the  change  ?  It  obviously  does  not ;  for  the  actuality 
acquired  in  the  change  is,  as  such,  a  new  entity,  a  new  perfection,  in  some 
degree  positively  surpassing  the  total  reality  of  the  combined  active  powers 
and  passive  potentialities  which  it  replaces.  In  other  words,  if  the  actuality 
resulting  from  the  change  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  immediate  active  and 
passive  antecedents  of  the  change,  then  we  are  inevitably  referred,  for  an 
adequate  explanation  of  this  actuality,  to  some  actual  being  above  and  beyond 
these  antecedents.  And  to  what  sort  of  actual  being  are  we  referred  ?  To  a 
being  in  which  the  actuality  of  the  effect  resides  only  in  the  same  way  as  it 
resides  in  the  immediate  active  and  passive  antecedents  of  the  change,  that 
is  potentially  ?  No  ;  for  this  would  be  useless,  merely  pushing  the  difficulty 
one  step  farther  back.  We  are  obliged  rather  to  infer  the  existence  of  an 
Actual  Being  in  whom  the  actuality  of  the  said  effect  resides  actually :  not 
formally,  of  course,  as  it  exists  in  itself  when  it  is  produced  through  the  change  ; 
but  eminently,  eminenter^  in  such  a  way  that  its  actualization  outside  Him- 
self and  under  His  influence  does  not  involve  in  Him  any  loss  of  perfection, 
any  increase  of  perfection,  or  any  manner  of  change  whatsoever.  We  are 
compelled  in  this  way  to  infer,  from  the  existence  of  change  in  the  universe 
of  our  direct  experience,  the  existence  of  a  transcendent  Immovable  Prime 
Mover,  a  Primum  M ovens  Immobile.  All  the  active  causes  or  principles  of 
change  which  fall  under  our  notice  in  the  universe  of  direct  experience  are 
themselves  subject  to  change.  None  of  them  causes  change  in  any  other 
thing  without  itself  undergoing  change.  The  active  power  of  finite  causes  i§ 

5 


66  ONTOLOGY 

itself  finite.  By  educing  the  potentiality  of  other  things  into  actuality  they 
gradually  use  up  their  own  energy  ;  they  diminish  and  lose  their  active  power 
of  producing  effects  :  this  belongs  to  the  very  nature  of  finite  causes  as  such. 
Moreover,  they  are  themselves  passive  as  well  as  active  ;  interaction  is  uni- 
versal among  the  finite  causes  which  constitute  the  universe  of  our  direct 
experience  :  they  all  alike  have  passive  potentiality  and  undergo  change. 
Now,  if  any  one  finite  cause  in  this  system  cannot  adequately  account  for  the 
new  actuality  evolved  from  the  potential  in  any  single  process  of  change, 
neither  can  the  whole  system  adequately  account  for  it.  What  is  true  of  them 
distributively  is  true  of  them  taken  all  together  when  there  is  question  of  what 
belongs  to  their  nature  ;  and  the  fact  that  their  active  powers  and  passive 
potentialities  fall  short  of  the  actuality  of  the  effects  we  attribute  to  them  is 
a  fact  that  appertains  to  their  very  nature  as  finite  things.  The  phenomenon 
of  continuous  change  in  the  universe  involves  the  continuous  appearance  of 
new  actual  being.  To  account  for  this  constant  stream  of  actuality  we  are 
of  necessity  carried  beyond  the  system  of  finite,  changing  being  itself;  we  are 
forced  to  infer  the  existence  of  a  source  and  principle  which  must  itself  be 
purely  actual  and  exempt  from  all  change — a  Being  who  can  cause  all  the 
actuality  that  results  from  change  without  losing  or  gaining  or  changing  in 
anyway  Himself,  because  Repossesses  all  finite  actuality  in  Himself  in  a  super- 
eminent  manner  which  transcends  all  the  efforts  of  finite  human  intelligence  to 
comprehend  or  characterize  in  any  adequate  or  positive  manner.  The 
scholastics  expressed  this  in  the  simple  aphorism  :  Omne  novum  ens  est  a  Deo. 
And  it  is  the  realization  of  this  profound  truth  that  underlies  their  teaching  on 
the  necessity  of  the  Divine  Concur sus,  i.e.  the  influence  of  the  Infinite  First 
Cause  or  Prime  Mover  permeating  the  efficiency  of  all  finite  or  created  causes. 
Here,  for  example,  is  a  brief  recent  statement  of  that  doctrine  : — 

"  If  we  must  admit  a  causal  influence  of  these  things  [of  direct  experi- 
ence] on  one  another,  then  a  closer  examination  will  convince  us  that  a  finite 
thing  can  never  be  the  adequate  cause  of  any  effect,  but  is  always,  meta- 
physically regarded,  only  a  part-cause,  ever  needing  to  be  completed  by 
another  cause.  Every  effect  is — at  least  under  one  aspect,  at  least  as  an 
effect — something  new,  something  that  was  not  there  before.  Even  were  the 
effect  contained,  whether  formally  or  virtually,  in  the  cause,  it  is  certainly  not 
identical  with  this  latter,  for  if  it  were  there  would  be  no  causality,  nothing 
would  *  happen  '.  In  all  causing  and  happening,  something  which  was  here- 
tofore only  possible,  becomes  real  and  actual.  But  things  cannot  determine 
themselves  to  influence  others,  or  to  receive  the  influence  of  others,  since  they 
are  not  dependent  in  their  being  on  one  another.  Hence  the  necessary 
inference  that  all  being,  all  happening,  all  change,  requires  the  concurrence 
of  an  Absolute  Principle  of  being.  When  two  things  act  on  each  other  the 
Absolute  Being  must  work  in  and  with  them,  the  same  Absolute  Being  in 
both — to  relate  them  to  each  other,  and  supplement  their  natural  in- 
sufficiency." 

"  Such  is  the  profound  teaching  about  the  Divine  Concursus  with  every 
creature.  .  .  .  God  works  in  all  and  with  all.  He  permeates  all  reality, 
everywhere  ;  there  is  no  being  beyond  Him  or  independent  of  His  conserving 
and  concurring  power.  Just  as  creatures  are  brought  into  being  only  through 
God's  omnipotence,  and  of  themselves  have  no  independent  reality,  so  do 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  67 

they  need  the  self-same  ever-present,  all-sustaining  power  to  continue  in 
this  being  and  develop  it  by  their  activity.  Every  event  in  Nature  is  a  tran- 
sitory, passing  phenomenon,  so  bound  up  with  conditions  and  circumstances 
that  it  must  disappear  to  give  place  to  some  other.  How  could  a  mode  of 
being  so  incomplete  discharge  its  function  in  existence  without  the  concur- 
rence of  the  First  Cause  ?  "  1 

We  have  seen  now  that  in  the  real  order  the  potential  pre- 
supposes the  actual ;  for  the  potential  cannot  actualize  itself,  but 
can  be  actualized  only  by  the  action  of  some  already  actual  be- 
ing. Nor  can  we  avoid  this  consequence  by  supposing  the 
potential  being  to  have  had  no  actual  beginning  in  time,  but  to  be 
eternally  in  process  of  actualization  ;  for  even  so,  it  must  be  eternally 
actualized  by  some  other  actual  being — a  position  which  Aristotle 
and  some  scholastics  admit  to  be  possible.  Whether,  then,  we  con- 
ceive the  actualization  as  beginning  in  time  or  as  proceeding  from 
all  eternity,  it  is  self-contradictory  to  suppose  the  potential  as 
capable  of  actualizing  itself. 

It  is  likewise  true  that  the  actual  precedes  the  possible  in  the 
order  of  our  knowledge.  The  concept  of  a  thing  as  possible  pre- 
supposes the  concept  of  that  thing  as  actual  ;  for  the  possible  is 
understood  to  be  possible  only  by  its  intelligible  relation  to  actual 
existence.  This  is  evidently  true  of  extrinsic  possibility  ;  but  our 
knowledge  even  of  the  intrinsic  possibility  of  a  thing  cannot  be 
the  first  knowledge  we  possess  in  the  order  of  time.  Our  first 
knowledge  is  of  the  actual ;  for  the  mind's  first  cognitive  act 
must  have  for  object  either  itself  or  something  not  itself.  But  it 
knows  itself  as  a  consciously  acting  and  therefore  actual  being. 
And  it  comes  to  know  things  other  than  itself  only  by  the  fact 
that  such  other  things  act  upon  it  either  immediately  or  mediately 
through  sense-consciousness ;  so  that  in  every  hypothesis  its  first 
known  object  is  something  actual.2 

The  priority  of  the  actual  as  compared  with  the  potential  in  the  real 
order,  suggests  a  proof  of  the  existence  of  God  in  the  manner  indicated 
above.  It  also  affords  a  refutation  of  Hegelian  monism.  The  conception 
of  the  world,  including  all  the  phenomena  of  mind  and  matter,  as  the  gradual 
self-manifestation  or  evolution  of  a  potential  being  eternally  actualizing  itself, 
is  a  self-contradictory  conception.  Scholastics  rightly  maintain  that  the 
realities  from  which  we  derive  our  first  most  abstract  and  transcendental 
notion  of  being  in  general,  are  actual  realities.  Hegelians  seize  on  the  object 

1  KLIMKE,  Der  Monismus  und  seine  philosophischen  Grundlagen,  p.  185.  Cf. 
Irish  Theological  Quarterly,  vol.  vii.  (April,  1912),  p.  157  sqq.,  art.  Reflections  on 
Some  Forms  of  Monism. 

3  For  relations  oipotentia  and  actus,  cf.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  §  214, 

5* 


68  ONTOLOGY 

of  this  notion,  identify  it  with  pure  thought,  proclaim  it  the  sole  reality,  and 
endow  it  with  the  power  of  becoming  actually  everything.  It  is  manifest, 
therefore,  that  they  endow  purely  potential  being  with  the  power  of  actualizing 
itself. 

Nor  can  they  fairly  avoid  this  charge  by  pointing  out  that  although  their 
starting-point  is  not  actual  being  (with  which  the  scholastic  philosophy  of 
being  commences),  yet  neither  is  it  possible  or  potential  being,  but  being 
which  has  neither  of  these  determinations,  being  which  abstracts  from  both, 
like  the  real  being  of  the  scholastics  (7,  13).  For  though  real  being  can 
be  an  object  of  abstract  human  thought  without  either  of  the  predicates  "  ex- 
istent "  or  "  non-existent,"  yet  it  cannot  be  anything  in  the  real  order  without 
either  of  them.  There  it  must  be  either  actually  existent  or  else  merely 
potential.  But  Hegelians  claim  absolutely  indeterminate  being  to  be  as  such 
something  in  the  real  order  ;  and  though  they  try  to  distinguish  it  from  potential 
being  they  nevertheless  think  of  it  as  potential  being,  for  they  distinctly  and  re- 
peatedly declare  that  it  can  become  all  things,  and  does  become  all  things,  and 
is  constantly,  eternally  transforming  itself  by  an  internal  dialectic  process  into  the 
phenomena  which  constitute  the  worlds  of  mind  and  matter.  Contrasting  it  with 
the  abstract  "inert  "  being  which  they  conceive  to  be  the  object  of  the  tradi- 
tional metaphysics,  they  endow  "  indeterminate  being  "  with  the  active  power  of 
producing,  and  the  passive  potentiality  of  becoming,  actually  everything.  Thus, 
in  order  to  show  a  priori  how  this  indeterminate  being  must  evolve  itself 
by  internal  logical  necessity  into  the  world  of  our  direct  and  immediate  ex- 
perience, they  suppose  it  to  be  subject  to  change  and  to  be  at  the  same  time  self- 
actualizing,  in  direct  opposition  to  the  axiom  that  potential  reality,  reality 
which  is  subject  to  change,  cannot  actualize  itself:  Quidquid  movetur  ab 
alio  moveatur  oportet. 

ii.  KINDS  OF  CHANGE.— Following  Aristotle,1  we  may  re- 
cognize a  broad  and  clear  distinction  between  four  great  classes 
of  change  (yu-era/SoX?;,  mutatio]  in  the  phenomena  of  our  sense 
experience :  local  change  dcbn^i^  Kara  TOTTOV,  <j>opd,  latio) ; 
quantitative  change  («a.ra  TO  TTOCTOV,  avtycns  tf  fydia-is,  augmentatio 
vel  diminutid] ;  qualitative  change  {Kara  TO  TTOLOV,  aXXotwcr^?, 
alteratio] ;  and  substantial  change  (/car*  ova-Lav,  yevecris  %  <j>6opa). 
The  three  former  are  accidental,  i.e.  do  not  reach  or  affect  the 
essence  or  substance  of  the  thing  that  is  changed ;  the  fourth  is 
substantial,  a  change  of  essence.  Substantial  change  is  regarded 
as  taking  place  instantaneously,  as  soon  as  the  condition  brought 
about  by  the  accidental  changes  leading  up  to  it  becomes 
naturally  incompatible  with  the  essence  or  nature  of  the  subject. 
The  accidental  changes,  on  the  other  hand,  are  regarded  as  taking 
place  gradually,  as  realizing  and  involving  a  succession  of  states 
or  conditions  in  the  subject.  These  changes,  especially  when 
they  take  place  in  corporeal  things,  are  properly  described  as 

1  C/,  Physics,  v.,  i  ;  De  Anima,  i.,  3. 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  69 

movement  or  motion  (motus,  motid}.  By  movement  or  motion  in 
the  strict  sense  we  therefore  mean  any  change  which  takes  place 
gradually  or  successively  in  a  corporeal  thing.  It  is  only  in  a 
wider  and  improper  sense  that  these  terms  are  sometimes  applied 
to  activity  of  whatsoever  kind,  even  of  spiritual  beings.  In  this 
sense  we  speak  of  thoughts,  volitions,  etc.,  as  movements  of  the 
soul,  motus  animae ;  or  of  God  as  the  Prime  Mover  ever  in  motion, 
the  Primum  M ovens  semper  in  motu. 

With  local  change  in  material  things,  as  also  with  quantitative 
change,  growth  and  diminution  of  quantity  (mass  and  volume), 
everyone  is  perfectly  familiar.  From  the  earliest  times,  more- 
over, we  find  both  in  science  and  philosophy  the  conception  of 
matter  as  composed  of,  and  divisible  into,  ultimate  particles, 
themselves  supposed  to  admit  of  no  further  real  division,  and 
hence  called  atoms  (a-ro/zo?,  re^vay).  From  the  days  of  Grecian 
atomism  men  have  attempted  to  show  that  all  change  in  the 
Universe  is  ultimately  reducible  to  changes  of  place,  order, 
spatial  arrangement  and  collocation,  of  those  hypothetical 
atomic  factors.  It  has  likewise  been  commonly  assumed  that 
change  in  mass  is  solely  due  to  change  in  the  number  of 
those  atoms,  and  change  in  volume  (of  the  same  mass)  to  the 
relative  density  or  closeness  with  which  the  atoms  aggregate 
together ;  though  some  have  held — and  it  is  certainly  not  incon- 
ceivable— that  exactly  the  same  material  entity,  an  atom  let  us 
say,  may  be  capable  of  real  contraction  and  expansion,  and  so 
of  real  change  of  volume  :  as  distinct  from  the  apparent  contrac- 
tion and  expansion  of  bodies,  a  change  which  is  supposed  to  be 
due  to  change  of  density,  i.e.  to  decrease  or  increase  in  the 
dimensions  of  the  pores  or  interstices  between  the  smaller  con- 
stituent parts  or  molecules.  However  this  may  be,  the  attempts 
to  reduce  all  change  in  physical  nature  to  mere  mechanical  change 
i.e.  to  spatial  motions  of  the  masses  (molar  motions),  the  mole- 
cules (molecular  motions),  and  the  atoms  or  other  ultimate  com- 
ponents of  matter  (whether  vibratory,  undulatory,  rotatory  or 
translational  motions),  have  never  been  satisfactory. 

Qualitative  change  is  wider  than  material  change,  for  it  in- 
cludes changes  in  spiritual  beings,  i.e.  in  beings  which  are  outside 
the  category  of  quantity  and  have  a  mode  of  existence  altogether 
different  from  the  extensional,  spatial  existence  which  characterizes 
matter.  When,  for  instance,  the  human  mind  acquires  knowledge, 
it  undergoes  qualitative  change.  But  matter,  toe,  has  qualities, 


70  ONTOLOGY 

and  is  subject  to  qualitative  change.  It  is  endowed  with  active 
qualities,  i.e.  with  powers,  forces,  energies,  whereby  it  can  not 
merely  perform  mechanical  work  by  producing  local  changes  in 
the  distribution  of  its  mass  throughout  space,  but  also  produce 
physical  and  chemical  changes  which  seem  at  least  to  be  different 
in  their  nature  from  mere  mechanical  changes.  It  is  likewise 
endowed  with  pa ssive  qualities  which  appear  to  the  senses  to  be 
of  various  kinds,  differing  from  one  another  and  from  the 
mechanical  or  quantitative  characteristics  of  size,  shape,  motion, 
rest,  etc.  While  these  latter  are  called  "  primary  qualities  "  of 
bodies — because  conceived  to  be  more  fundamental  and  more 
closely  inherent  in  the  real  and  objective  nature  of  matter — or 
"  common  sensibles  "  (sensibilia  communia),  because  perceptible 
by  more  than  one  of  our  external  senses — the  former  are  called 
"  secondary  qualities,"  because  conceived  to  be  less  characteristic 
of  the  real  and  objective  nature  of  matter,  and  more  largely  sub- 
jective products  of  our  own  sentient  cognitive  activity — or  "  proper 
sensibles  "  (sensibilia  propria),  because  each  of  them  is  apprehended 
by  only  one  of  our  external  senses :  colour,  sound,  taste,  odour, 
temperature,  material  state  or  texture  (e.g.  roughness,  liquidity, 
softness,  etc.).  Now  about  all  these  perceived  qualities  and  their 
changes  the  question  has  been  raised :  Are  they,  as  such,  i.e.  as 
perceived  by  us,  really  in  the  material  things  or  bodies  which 
make  up  the  physical  universe,  and  really  different  in  these 
bodies  from  the  quantitative  factors  and  motions  of  the  latter? 
Or,  as  such,  are  they  not  rather  partially  or  wholly  subjective 
phenomena — products,  at  least  in  part,  of  our  own  sense  per- 
ception, states  of  our  own  consciousness,  having  nothing  really 
corresponding  to  them  in  the  external  matter  of  the  universe 
beyond  the  quantitative,  mechanical  factors  and  motions  whereby 
matter  acts  upon  our  faculties  of  sense  cognition  and  produces 
these  states  of  consciousness  in  us?  This  is  a  question  of  the 
first  importance,  the  solution  of  which  belongs  to  Epistemology. 
Aristotle  would  not  allow  that  the  objective  material  universe 
can  be  denuded,  in  the  way  just  suggested,  of  qualities  and 
qualitative  change;  and  scholastic  philosophers  have  always 
held  the  same  general  view.  What  we  have  to  note  here,  how- 
ever, in  regard  to  the  question  is  simply  this,  that  even  if  the 
world  of  matter  were  thus  simplified  by  transferring  all  qualitative 
change  to  the  subjective  domain  of  consciousness,  the  reality  of 
qualitative  change  and  all  the  problems  arising  from  it  would 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  71 

still  persist.  To  transfer  qualitative  change  from  object  to  sub- 
ject, from  matter  to  mind,  is  certainly  something  very  different 
from  explaining  it  as  reducible  to  quantitative  or  mechanical 
change.  The  simplification  thus  effected  would  be  more  apparent 
than  real :  it  would  be  simplifying  the  world  of  matter  by  trans- 
ferring its  complexity  to  the  world  of  mind.  This  consideration 
is  one  which  is  sometimes  lost  sight  of  by  scientists  who  advance 
mechanical  hypotheses  as  ultimate  explanations  of  the  nature 
and  activities  of  the  physical  universe. 

If  all  material  things  and  processes  could  be  ultimately 
analysed  into  configurations  and  local  motions  of  space-occupying 
atoms,  homogeneous  in  nature  and  differing  only  in  size  and 
shape,  then  each  of  these  ultimate  atomic  factors  would  be  itself 
exempt  from  intrinsic  change  as  to  its  own  essence  and  in- 
dividuality. In  this  hypothesis  there  would  be  really  no  such 
thing  as  substantial  change.  The  collection  of  atoms  would  form 
an  immutable  core  of  material  reality,  wholly  simple  and  ever 
actual.  Such  an  hypothesis,  however,  is  utterly  inadequate  as 
an  explanation  of  the  facts  of  life  and  consciousness.  And  even 
as  an  account  of  the  processes  of  the  inorganic  universe  it  en- 
counters insuperable  difficulties.  The  common  belief  of  men  has 
always  been  that  even  in  this  domain  of  reality  there  are  funda- 
mentally different  kinds  of  matter,  kinds  which  differ  from  one 
another  not  merely  in  the  shape  and  size  and  configuration  and 
arrangement  of  their  ultimate  actual  constituents,  but  even  in  the 
very  substance  or  nature  of  these  constituents ;  and  that  there 
are  some  material  changes  which  affect  the  actual  substance 
itself  of  the  matter  which  undergoes  them.  This  belief  scholastics, 
again  following  Aristotle,  hold  to  be  a  correct  belief,  and  one 
which  is  well  grounded  in  reason.  And  this  belief  in  turn  in- 
volves the  view  that  every  type  of  actual  material  entity — whether 
merely  inorganic,  or  endowed  with  life,  or  even  allied  with  a 
higher,  spiritual  mode  of  being  as, in  the  case  of  man  himself — is 
essentially  composite,  essentially  a  synthesis  of  potential  and  actual 
principles  of  being,  and  therefore  capable  of  substantial  change. 
The  actually  existing  material  being  scholastics  describe  as 
materia  secunda,  the  vKj)  co^ar^  of  Aristotle  ;  the  purely  potential 
factor,  which  is  actualized  in  this  or  that  particular  kind  of  matter, 
they  describe  as  materia  prima,  the  V\TJ  TrpwTi)  of  Aristotle ;  the 
actualizing,  specifying,  formative  principle,  they  designate  as 
forma  substantialis  (eZSo?).  And  since  the  purely  potential  prin- 


72  ONTOLOGY 

ciple  cannot  actually  exist  except  as  actualized  by  some  formative 
principle,  all  substantial  change  or  transition  from  one  substantial 
type  to  another  is  necessarily  both  a  corruptio  and  a  generatio. 
That  is,  it  involves  the  actual  disappearance  of  one  substantial 
form  and  the  actual  appearance  of  another.  Hence  the  scholastic 
aphorism  regarding  substantial  change  :  Corruptio  unius  est  gen- 
eratio alterius  :  the  corruption  or  destruction  of  one  kind  of 
material  thing  involves  the  generation  of  another  kind. 

The  concepts  of  materia  prima  and  forma  substantiate  are 
concepts  not  of  phenomenal  entities  directly  accessible  to  the 
senses  or  the  imagination,  but  of  principles  which  can  be  reached 
only  mediately  and  by  intellect  proper.  They  cannot  be  pictured 
in  the  imagination,  which  can  only  attain  to  the  sensible.  We 
may  help  ourselves  to  grasp  them  intellectually  by  the  analogy 
of  the  shapeless  block  of  marble  and  the  figure  educed  there- 
from by  the  sculptor,  but  this  is  only  an  analogy  :  just  as  the 
statue  results  from  the  union  of  an  accidental  form  with  an 
existing  matter,  so  this  matter  itself,  the  substance  marble,  is 
composed  of  a  substantial  term  and  a  primordial,  potential  matter. 
But  there  the  analogy  ceases. 

Furthermore,  when  we  consider  that  the  proper  and  primary 
objects  of  the  human  intellect  itself  are  corporeal  things  or  bodies, 
and  that  these  bodies  actually  exist  in  nature  only  as  composite 
substances,  subject  to  essential  or  substantial  change,  we  shall 
realize  why  it  is  that  the  concept  of  materia  prima  especially, 
being  a  mediate  and  negative  concept,  is  so  difficult  to  grasp  ; 
for,  as  the  scholastics  describe  it,  translating  Aristotle's  formula, 
it  is  in  itself  neque  quid,  neque  quantum^  neque  quale,  neque  aliquid 
eorum  quibus  ens  determinatur}  But  it  is  through  intellectual 
concepts  alone,  and  not  through  imagination  images,  that  we 
may  hope  to  analyse  the  nature  and  processes  even  of  the  world 
of  corporeal  reality^  and,  as  St.  Thomas  well  observes,  it  was 
because  the  ancient  Greek  atomists  did  not  rise  above  the  level 
of  thinking  in  imagination  images  that  they  failed  to  recognize 
the  existence,  or  explain  the  nature,  of  substantial  change  in  the 
material  universe2:  an  observation  which  applies  with  equal 


5*  S\i)v,  ty  KaO'  avr^v  /JL^TC  ri,  ju^re  voffbv,  /djre  irolov,  ^re  &\\o 
Aeyerat  ofs  &ptffrai  rb  ov.  —  Metaph.  vi.,  c.  iii. 

2  "  Decepit  antiques  philosophos  hanc  rationem  inducentes,  ignorantia  formse 
substantialis.  Non  enim  adhuc  tantum  profecerant  ut  intellectus  eorum  se  elevaret 
ad  aliquid  quod  est  supra  sensibilia  :  et  ideo  illas  formas  tantum  consideraverunt, 
quae  sunt  sensibilia  propria  vel  communia.  Hujusmodi  autem  manifestum  est  esse 


BECOMING  AND  ITS  IMPLICATIONS  73 

force  to  those  scientists  and  philosophers  of  our  own  time  who 
would  fain  reduce  all  physical  processes  to  mere  mechanical 
change. 

Those,  then,  are  the  principal  kinds  of  change,  as  analysed 
by  Aristotle  and  the  scholastics.  We  may  note,  finally,  that  the 
distinction  between  immanent  and  transitive  activity  is  also  ap- 
plied to  change — that  is,  to  change  considered  as  a  process,  not 
to  the  result  of  the  change,  to  change  in  fieri,  not  in  facto  esse.  Im- 
manent movement  or  activity  (motio,  actio  immanens)  is  that  of  which 
the  term,  the  educed  actuality,  remains  within  the  agent — which 
latter  is  therefore  at  once  both  agens  and  patiens.  Vital  action  is 
of  this  kind.  Transitive  movement  or  activity,  on  the  other 
hand  (motio,  actio  transiens),  is  that  of  which  the  term  is  some 
actuality  educed  in  a  being  other  than  the  agent.  The  patiens  is 
here  really  distinct  from  the  agens ;  and  it  is  in  the  former,  not 
in  the  latter,  that  the  change  takes  place  :  actio  fit  in  pas  so.  All 
change  in  the  inorganic  universe  is  of  this  sort  (101). 

accidentia,  ut  album  et  nigrum,  magnum  et  parvum,  et  hujusmodi.  Forma  autem 
substantialis  non  est  sensibilis  nisi  per  accidens,  et  ideo  ad  ejus  cognitionem  non 
pervenerunt,  ut  scirent  ipsam  materiam  distinguere." — In  Metaph.  vii.,  2. 


CHAPTER  III. 

EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE. 

12.  EXISTENCE. — In  the  preceding  chapters  we  examined 
reality  in  itself  and  in  its  relation  to  change  or  becoming.  We 
have  now  to  examine  it  in  relation  to  its  actual  existence  and  to 
its  intrinsic  possibility  (7,  a). 

Existing  or  being  (in  the  participial  sense :  esse,  existere, 
TO  zlvai)  is  a  simple,  indefinable  notion.  A  being  is  said  to  exist 
when  it  is  not  merely  possible  but  actual,  when  it  is  not  merely 
potential  in  its  active  and  passive  causes  but  has  become  actual 
through  those  causes  (existere  :  ex-sisto :  ex-stare  :  to  stand  forth, 
distinct  from  its  causes) ;  or,  if  it  have  no  causes,  when  it  simply 
is  (esse), — in  which  sense  God,  the  Necessary,  purely  Actual 
Being,  simply  is.  Thus,  existence  implies  the  notion  of  actuality, 
and  is  conceived  as  that  by  which  any  thing  or  essence  is,  distinct 
from  nothingness,  in  the  actual  order}  Or,  again,  it  is  the  actuality 
of  any  thing  or  essence.  About  any  conceivable  being  we  may  ask 
two  distinct  questions  :  (a)  What  is  it  ?  and  (£)  Does  such  a  being 
|  actually  exist  ?  The  answer  to  the  former  gives  us  the  essence, 
what  is  presented  to  the  mind  through  the  concept ;  the  answer 

Lto  the  latter  informs  us  about  the  actual  existence  of  the  being  or 
essence  in  question. 

To  the  mind  of  any  individual  man  the  real  existence  (as 
also  the  real  essence)  of  any  being  whatsoever,  not  excepting  his 
own,  can  be  known  only  through  its  ideal  presence  in  his  mind, 
through  the  concept  or  percept  whereby  it  becomes  for  him  a 
"  known  object,"  an  objectum  cognitum.  But  this  actual  presence 
of  known  being  to  the  knowing  mind  must  not  be  confounded 
with  the  real  existence  of  such  being  (4).  Real  being  does  not  get 
its  real  existence  in  our  minds  or  from  our  minds.  Our  cognition 
does  not  produce,  but  only  discovers,  actually  existing  reality. 
The  latter,  by  acting  on  the  mind,  engenders  therein  the  cognition 

1  "  Esse  actum  quemdam  nominat :  non  enim  dicitur  esse  aliquid,  ex  hoc  quod 
est  in  potentia,  sed  ex  hoc  quod  est  in  actu." — ST.  THOMAS,  Contra  Gentes,  i.,  ch. 
xxii.,  4. 

74 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  75 

of  itself.  Now  all  our  knowledge  comes  through  the  senses  ; 
and  sense  cognition  is  excited  in  us  by  the  direct  action  of 
material  or  phenomenal  being  on  our  sense  faculties.  But 
through  sense  cognition  the  mind  is  able  to  attain  to  a  knowledge 
both  of  the  possibility  and  of  the  actual  existence  of  suprasensible 
or  spiritual  realities.  Hence  we  cannot  describe  existence  as  the 
power  which  material  realities  have  to  excite  in  us  a  knowledge 
of  themselves.  Their  existence  is  prior  to  this  activity  :  prius  est 
esse  quam  agere.  Nor  can  we  limit  existence  to  material  realities  ; 
for  if  there  are  spiritual  realities  these  too  have  existence,  though 
this  existence  can  be  discerned  only  by  intellect,  and  not  by 
sense. 

13.  ESSENCE. — In  any  existing  thing  we  can  distinguish 
what  the  thing  is,  its  essence,  from  its  actual  existence.  If  we 
abstract  from  the  actual  existence  of  a  thing,  not  considering 
whether  it  actually  exists  or  not,  and  fix  our  attention  merely  on 
what  the  thing  is,  we  are  thinking  of  its  real  essence.  If  we 
positively  exclude  the  notion  of  actual  existence  from  our  con- 
cept of  the  essence,  and  think  of  the  latter  as  not  actually  exist- 
ing, we  are  considering  it  formally  as  a  possible  essence.  There 
is  no  being,  even  the  Necessary  Being,  whose  essence  we  cannot 
think  of  in  the  former  way,  i.e.  without  including  in  our  concept 
the  notion  of  actual  existence  ;  but  we  cannot  without  error 
positively  exclude  the  notion  of  actual  existence  from  our  concept 
of  the  Necessary  Being,  or  think  of  the  latter  as  a  merely  possible 
essence. 

Taken  in  its  widest  sense,  the  essence  of  a  thing  (ovaia, 
essentia,  TO  ri  earn,  quod  quid  est,  quidditas)  means  that  by  which  a 
thing  is  what  it  is  :  id  quo  res  est  id  quod  est :  that  which  gives 
us  the  answer  to  the  question,  What  is  this  thing  ?  Quid  est  haec 
res  ?  TL  ea-Ti  r68e  n ; *  Now  of  course  any  individual  thing  is 
what  it  is  just  precisely  by  all  the  reality  that  is  in  it ;  but  we 
have  no  direct  or  intuitive  intellectual  insight  into  this  reality ; 
we  understand  it  only  by  degrees  ;  we  explore  it  from  various 

1  The  etymology  of  Aristotle's  description  of  the  essence  as  rb  rl  i\v  efvot  is  not 
easy  to  explain.  The  expression  rb  e?j/cu  supposes  a  dative  understood,  e.g.  rb 
avdpunrw  e?^at,  the  being  proper  to  man.  To  the  question  rl  tffri  rb  avdpiaTry  e?»/at ; 
what  is  the  being  or  essence  proper  to  man  ?  the  answer  is  :  that  which  gives  the 
definition  of  man,  that  which  explains  what  he  is — ri  $v.  Is  the  imperfect,  rl  V> 
an  archaic  form  for  the  present,  rl  e<n-t ;  or  is  it  a  deliberate  suggestion  of  the  pro- 
found doctrine  that  the  essence  as  ideal,  or  possible,  is  anterior  to  its  actual,  physical 
realization  ?  Commentators  are  not  agreed.  C/.  MATTHIAS  KAPPES,  Aristoteles- 
Lexicon,  p.  25  (Paderborn,  1894)  >  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  p.  30  n. 


;6  ONTOLOGY 

points  of  view,  abstracting  and  generalizing  partial  aspects  i  of  it 
as  we  compare  it  with  other  things  and  seek  to  classify  and  define 
it :  ratio  humana  essentias  rerum  quasi  venatur,  as  the  scholastics 
say :  the  human  mind  hunts,  as  it  were,  after  the  essences  or 
natures  of  things.  Understanding  the  individual  datum  of  sense 
experience  (what  Aristotle  called  ro£e  TI,  or  ovaria  7rpa)T7)y  and 
the  scholastics  hoc  aliquid,  or  substantia  prima\  e.g.  this  individual, 
Socrates,  first  under  the  vaguest  concept  of  being,  then  gradually 
under  the  more  and  more  determinate  concepts  of  substance, 
corporeal,  living,  sentient,  rational,  it  finally  forms  the  complex 
concept  of  his  species  infima,  expressed  by  his  lowest  class-name, 
"  man,"  and  explicitly  set  forth  in  the  definition  of  his  specific 
nature  as  a  "  rational  animal ".  Nor  does  our  reason  fail  to 
realize  that  by  reaching  this  concept  of  the  specific  essence  or 
nature  of  the  individual,  Socrates,  it  has  not  yet  grasped  all  the 
reality  whereby  the  individual  is  what  he  is.  It  has  reached 
what  he  has  in  common  with  all  other  individuals  of  his  class, 
what  is  essential  to  him  as  a  man  ;  it  has  distinguished  this  from 
the  unanalysed  something  which  makes  him  this  particular  in- 
dividual of  his  class,  and  which  makes  his  specific  essence  this 
individual  essence  (essentia  "  atoma"  or  "  individua  ")  ;  and  it  has 
also  distinguished  his  essence  from  those  accidental  and  ever 
varying  attributes  which  are  not  essential  to  him  as  a  man, 
and  from  those  which  are  not  essential  to  him  as  Socrates. 
It  is  only  the  unfathomed  individual  essence,  as  existing  hie  et 
nunc,  that  is  concrete.  All  the  mind's  generic  and  specific  repre- 
sentations of  it — e.g.  of  Socrates  as  a  corporeal  substance,  a 
living  being,  a  sentient  being,  a  rational  animal — are  abstract, 
and  all  more  or  less  inadequate,  none  of  them  exhausting  its 
knowable  reality.  But  it  is  only  in  so  far  as  the  mind  is  able  to 
represent  concrete  individual  things  by  such  abstract  concepts, 
that  it  can  attain  to  intellectual  knowledge  of  their  nature  or 
reality.  Hence  it  is  that  by  the  term  "essence,"  simply  and  sine 
addito,  we  always  mean  the  essence  as  grasped  by  abstract 
generic  or  specific  concepts  (&So9,  species),  and  as  thus  capable  of 
definition  (^0709,  ratio  rei).  "  The  essence,"  says  St.  Thomas, 
"  is  that  by  which  the  thing  is  constituted  in  its  proper  genus  or 
species,  and  which  we  signify  by  the  definition  which  states  what 
the  thing  is".1  Thus  understood,  the  essence  is  abstract,  and 

1  Essentia  est  illud  per  quod  res  constituitur  in  proprio  genere  vel  specie,  et 
quod  significamus  per  definitionem  indicantem  quid  est  res. — De  Ente  et  Essentia, 
ch.  i. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  77 

gives  the  specific  or  generic  type  to  which  the  individual  thing 
belongs  ;  but  we  may  also  mean  by  essence,  the  concrete  essence, 
the  individual  person  or  thing  (persona,  suppositum,  res  individud}. 
The  relations  between  the  objects  of  those  two  concepts  of  essence 
will  be  examined  later. 

Since  the  specific  essence  is  conceived  as  the  most  funda- 
mental reality  in  the  thing,  and  as  the  seat  and  source  of  all  the 
properties  and  activities  of  the  thing,  it  is  sometimes  defined  or 
described,  in  accordance  with  this  notion  of  it,  as  the  primary 
constitutive  of  the  thing  and  the  source  of  all  the  properties  of 
the  thing.  Conceived  as  the  foundation  of  all  the  properties  of 
the  thing  it  is  sometimes  called  substance  (ovo-ia,  substantid). 
Regarded  as  the  source  of  the  thing's  activities,  and  the  principle 
of  its  growth  or  development,  it  is  called  the  nature  of  the  thing 
(0voY9,  natura,  from  <£uo>,  nascor}.1 

Since  what  makes  a  thing  that  which  it  is,  by  the  same  fact 
differentiates  this  thing  from  every  other  thing,  the  essence  is 
rightly  conceived  as  that  which  gives  the  thing  its  characteristic^ 
being,  thereby  marking  it  off  from  all  other  being.  In  reality, 
of  course,  each  individual  being  is  distinct  by  all  that  it  is  from 
every  other.  But  since  we  get  our  intellectual  knowledge  of 
things  by  abstracting,  comparing,  generalizing,  and  classifying 
partial  aspects  of  them,  we  apprehend  part  of  the  imperfectly 
grasped  abstract  essence  of  each  individual  as  common  to  other 
classes  (generic),  and  part  as  peculiar  to  that  class  itself  (differ- 
ential) ;  and  thus  we  differentiate  classes  of  things  by  what  is  only 
part  of  their  essence,  by  what  we  call  the  differentia  of  each  class, 
distinguishing  mentally  between  it  and  the  generic  element : 
which  two  are  really  one,  really  identical,  in  every  individual  of 
the  species  thus  defined  and  classified. 

But  in  the  Aristotelian  and  scholastic  view  of  the  constitution 
of  any  corporeal  thing,  there  is  a  danger  of  taking  what  is  really 
only  part  of  the  essence  of  such  a  thing  for  the  whole  essence. 
According  to  this  view  all  corporeal  substance  is  essentially  com- 
posite, constituted  by  two  really  distinct,  substantial  principles, 
primal  matter  (Trpcorrj  v\rjy  materia  primd)  and  substantial  form 
(etSo?,  /juop(f)ij)  united  substantially,  as  potential  and  actual  prin- 
ciples, to  form  one  composite  nature  or  essence.  Now  the  kind, 
or  species,  or  specific  type,  to  which  a  body  belongs — e.g. ,  a  horse, 
an  oak,  gold,  water,  etc. — depends  upon  the  substantial  form  which 

,  Metafifi.,  iv.,  4  ;  ST.  THOMAS,  De  Potentia  D#,  q.  ix.,  art,  I, 


78  ONTOLOGY 

actualizes  the  matter  or  potential  principle.  In  so  far  as  the 
corporeal  essence  is  known  to  us  at  all  it  is  known  through  the 
form,  which  is  the  principle  of  all  the  characteristic  properties  and 
activities  of  that  particular  kind  of  body.  Hence  it  is  quite  natural 
that  the  etSo?,  pop^r),  or  forma  substantiates  of  a  body  should 
often  be  referred  to  as  the  specific  essence  of  the  body,  though  of 
course  the  essence  of  the  body  really  includes  the  material  as  well 
as  the  formal  factor. 

We  may  look  at  the  essence  of  any  being  from  two  points  of 
view.  If  we  consider  it  as  it  is  conceived  actually  to  exist  in  the 
being,  we  call  it  the  physical  essence.  If  we  consider  it  after  the 
manner  in  which  it  is  apprehended  and  defined  by  our  intellects 
through  generic  and  differentiating  concepts,  we  call  it  the  meta- 
physical essence.  Thus,  the  essence  of  man  conceived  by  the  two 
defining  concepts,  "  rational  animal,"  is  the  metaphysical  essence ; 
the  essence  of  man  as  known  to  be  composed  of  the  two  really 
distinct  substantial  principles,  soul  and  body,  is  the  physical  es- 
sence. Understood  in  this  way  both  are  one  and  the  same  essence 
considered  from  different  points  of  view — as  existing  in  the  actual 
order,  and  as  conceived  by  the  mind.1 

The  physical  essence  of  any  being,  understood  as  the  con- 
stitutive principle  or  principles  from  which  all  properties  spring, 
is  either  simple  or  composite  according  as  it  is  understood  to  con- 
sist of  one  such  constitutive  principle,  or  to  result  from  the  sub- 
stantial union  of  two  constitutive  principles,  a  material  and  a 
formal.  Thus,  the  essence  of  God,  the  essence  of  a  purely 
spiritual  being,  the  essence  of  the  human  soul,  are  physically 
simple ;  the  essence  of  man,  the  essences  of  all  corporeal  beings, 
are  physically  composite. 

According  to  our  mode  of  conceiving,  defining  and  classifying 
essences  by  means  of  the  abstract  generic  and  differential  grades  of 
being  which  we  apprehend  in  them,  all  essences,  even  physically 
simple  essences,  are  conceived  as  logically  and  metaphysically  com- 
posite. Moreover  we  speak  and  think  of  their  generic  and  differen- 

1  Sometimes,  however,  the  expression  "  metaphysical  essence  "  is  used  to  sig- 
nify those  objective  concepts,  and  those  only,  without  which  the  thing  cannot  lie  con- 
ceived, (or  sometimes,  even  the  one  which  is  considered  most  fundamental  among 
these),  and  therefore  as  not  explicitly  involving  the  concepts  of  properties  which 
follow  necessarily  from  the  former  ;  while  the  "  physical  essence  "  is  understood  to 
signify  all  those  real  elements  without  which  the  thing  cannot  actually  exist,  includ- 
ing, therefore,  all  such  necessary  properties.  Taken  in  this  sense  the  physical  es- 
sence of  man  would  include  not  merely  soul  and  body,  but  also  such  properties  as 
the  capacity  of  speech,  of  laughter,  of  using  tools,  of  cooking  food,  etc. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE 


79 


tial  factors  as  "  material "  and  "  formal "  respectively,  after  the 
analogy  of  the  composition  of  corporeal  or  physically  composite 
essences  from  the  union  of  two  really  distinct  principles,  matter 
and  form  ;  the  analogy  consisting  in  this,  that  as  matter  is  the 
indeterminate  principle  which  is  determined  and  actuated  by  form, 
so  the  generic  concept  is  the  indeterminate  concept  which  is  made 
definite  and  specific  by  that  of  the  differential  But  when  we 
think  of  the  genus  of  any  corporeal  essence  as  "  material,"  and  the 
differentia  as  "  formal,"  we  must  not  consider  these  "  metaphysical 
parts"  as  really  distinct;  whereas  the  "physical  parts"  of  a 
corporeal  substance  (such  as  man)  are  really  distinct.  The 
genus  (animal),  although  a  metaphysical  part,  expresses  the 
whole  essence  (man)  in  an  indeterminate  way;  whereas  the 
"matter"  which  is  a  physical  part,  does  not  express  the  whole 
essence  of  man,  nor  does  the  soul  which  is  also  a  physical  part, 
but  only  both  together.  Not  a  little  error  has  resulted  from  the 
confusion  of  thought  whereby  genus  and  differentia  have  been 
regarded  as  material  and  formal  constitutives  in  the  literal  sense 
of  those  expressions. 

14.  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  ABSTRACT  ESSENCES.— When  we 
consider  the  essences  of  things  not  as  actually  existing,  but  as 
intrinsically  possible — the  abstract,  metaphysical  essences,  there- 
fore— we  find  that  when  as  objects  of  our  thought  they  are 
analysed  into  their  simplest  constituents  and  compared  or 
related  with  themselves  and  with  one  another  they  present 
themselves  to  our  minds  in  these  relations  as  endowed  with 
certain  more  or  less  remarkable  characteristics. 

(a]  In  the  first  place,  being  abstract,  they  present  themselves 

1  Et  ex  hoc  patet  ratio,  writes  St.  Thomas,  quare  genus  et  species  et  differentia 
se  habeant  proportionaliter  ad  materiam,  formam  et  compositum  in  natura,  quamvis 
non  sint  idem  cum  illis ;  quia  neque  genus  est  materia,  sed  sumitur  a  materia  ut 
significans  totum ;  nee  differentia  est  forma,  sed  sumitur  a  forma  ut  significans 
totum.  Unde  dicimus  hominem  esse  animal  rationale,  et  non  ex  animali  et 
vationali ;  sicut  dicimus  eum  esse  ex  corpore  et  anima.  Ex  corpore  enim  et  anima 
dicitur  esse  homo,  sicut  ex  duabus  rebus  qusedam  tertia  res  constituta,  quae  neutra 
illarum  est :  homo  enim  nee  est  anima  neque  corpus  ;  sed  si  homo  aliquo  modo  ex 
animali  et  rationali  dicatur  esse,  non  erit  sicut  res  tertia  ex  duabus  rebus  sed  sicut  in- 
tellectus  [conceptus]  tertius  ex  duobus  intellectibus.  Intellectus  enim  animalis  est  sine 
determinatione  formae  specialis  naturam  exprimens  rei,  ex  eo  quod  est  materiale 
respectu  ultimae  perfectionis.  Intellectus  autem  hujus  differentiae,  rationalis,  consistit 
in  determinatione  formae  specialis  :  ex  quibus  duobus  intellectibus  constituitur  intel- 
lectus  speciei  vel  definitionis.  Et  ideo  sicut  res  constituta  ex  aliquibus  non  recipit 
praedicationem  earum  rerum  ex  quibus  constituitur ;  ita  nee  intellectus  recipit  prae- 
dicationem  eorum  intellectuum  ex  quibus  constituitur;  non  enim  diqimus,  quod 
definitio  sit  genus  vel  differentia. — De  Ente  et  Essentia,  cap.  in.. 


80  ONTOLOGY 

to  the  mind  as  being  what  they  are  independently  of  actual 
existence  at  any  particular  time  or  place.  Their  intelligibility  is 
something  apart  from  any  relation  to  any  actual  time  or  place. 
Being  intrinsically  possible,  they  might  exist  at  any  time  or 
place ;  but  as  possible,  they  are  out  of  time  and  out  of  place — 
detemporalized  and  delocalized,  if  we  may  be  permitted  to  use 
such  expressions.1 

(£)  Furthermore,  since  the  intellect  forms  its  notions  of  them, 
through  the  aid  of  the  senses  and  the  imagination,  from  actual 
realizations  of  themselves  or  their  constituent  factors,  and  since 
it  understands  them  to  be  intrinsically  possible,  or  free  from 
intrinsic  incompatibility  of  their  constituent  factors,  it  conceives 
them  to  be  capable  of  indefinitely  repeated  actualizations  through- 
out time  and  space — unless  it  sees  some  special  reason  to  the 
contrary,  as  it  does  in  the  case  of  the  Necessary  Being,  and 
(according  to  some  philosophers)  in  the  case  of  purely  immaterial 
beings  or  pure  spirits.  That  is  to  say  it  universalizes  them,  and 
sees  them  to  be  capable  of  existing  at  any  and  every  conceivable 
time  and  place.  This  relation  of  theirs  to  space  is  not  likely  to 
be  confounded  with  the  immensity  or  ubiquity  of  God.  But 
their  corresponding  relation  to  time  is  sometimes  described  as 
eternity  ;  and  if  it  is  so  described  it  must  be  carefully  distinguished 
from  the  positive  eternity  of  God,  the  Immutable  Being.  To 
distinguish  it  from  the  latter  it  is  usually  described  as  negative 
eternity, — this  indifference  of  the  possible  essence  to  actual 
existence  at  any  particular  point  of  time. 

But  apart  from  this  relation  which  we  conceive  it  as  having  to  existence 
in  the  order  of  actual  reality,  can  we,  or  do  we,  or  must  we  conceive  it  as  in 
itself  an  intrinsic  possibility  from  all  eternity -,  in  the  sense  that  it  never  began 
to  be  intrinsically  possible,  and  will  never  cease  to  be  so  ?  Must  we  attribute 
to  it  a  positive  eternity,  not  of  course  of  actuality  or  existence,  but  of  ideal 
being,  as  an  object  of  thought  to  an  Eternally  Existing  Mind  ?  What  is  this 
supposed  eternal  possibility  of  the  possible  essence  ?  Is  it  nothing  actual  : 
the  possible  as  such  is  nothing  actual.  But  i  is  it  anything  real  ?  Has  it  only 
ideal  being— esse  ideale  or  intentionale  ?  And  has  it  this  only  in  and  from 
the  human  mind,  or  independently  of  the  human  mind  ?  And  also  independ- 
ently of  the  actual  essences  from  which  the  human  mind  gets  the  data  for.  its 
thought, — so  that  we  must  ascribe  to  it  an  eternal  ideal  being  ?  To  these 
questions  we  shall  return  presently. 

(c)  Thirdly,  essences  considered  apart  from  their  actual  exist- 
ence, and  compared  with  their  own  constitutive  factors  or  with 
one  another,  reveal  to  the  mind  relations  which  the  mind  sees  to 

1  C/.  MERCIER,  Psychologic,  vol.  ii.,  §  169  (6th  edit.,  1903,  pp.  24-5). 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  81 

be  necessary,  and  which  it  formulates  for  itself  in  necessary  judg- 
ments,— judgments  in  materia  necessaria.  By  virtue  of  the 
principle  of  identity  an  abstract  essence  is  necessarily  what  it  is, 
what  the  mind  conceives  it  to  be,  what  the  mind  conceives  as  its 
definition.  Man,  as  an  object  of  thought,  is  necessarily  a  rational 
animal,  whether  he  actually  exists  or  not.  And  if  he  is  thought 
of  as  existing,  he  cannot  at  the  same  time  be  thought  of  as  non- 
existing, — by  the  principle  of  contradiction.  An  existing  man  is 
necessarily  an  existing  man, — by  the  principle  of  identity.  These 
logical  principles  are  rooted  in  the  nature  of  reality,  whether 
actual  or  possible,  considered  as  an  object  of  thought.  There  is  thus 
a  necessary  relation  between  any  complex  object  of  thought  and 
each  of  the  constituent  factors  into  which  the  mind  can  analyse 
it.  And,  similarly,  there  is  a  necessary  negative  relation — a 
relation  of  exclusion — between  any  object  of  thought  and  anything 
which  the  mind  sees  to  be  incompatible  with  that  object  as  a 
whole,  or  with  any  of  its  constituent  factors. 

Again,  the  mind  sees  necessary  relations  between  abstract 
essences  compared  with  one  another.  Five  and  seven  are 
necessarily  twelve.  Whatever  begins  to  exist  actually  must  have 
a  cause.  Contingent  being,  if  such  exists,  is  necessarily  dependent 
for  its  existence  on  some  other  actually  existing  being.  If 
potential  being  is  actualized  it  must  be  actualized  by  actual  being. 
The  three  interior  angles  of  a  triangle  are  necessarily  equal  to  two 
right  angles.  And  so  on. 

But  is  the  abstract  essence  itself — apart  from  all  mental 
analysis  of  it,  apart  from  all  comparison  of  it  with  its  constituent 
factors  or  with  other  essences — in  any  sense  necessary  ?  There  is 
no  question  of  its  actual  existence,  but  only  of  itself  as  an  object  of 
thought.  Now  our  thought  does  not  seem  to  demand  necessarily, 
or  have  a  necessary  connexion  with,  any  particular  object  of  which 
we  do  de  facto  think.  What  we  do  think  of  is  determined  by  our 
experience  of  actual  things.  And  the  things  which  we  conceive 
to  be  possible,  by  the  exercise  of  our  reason  upon  the  data  of  our 
senses,  memory  and  imagination,  are  determined  as  to  their 
nature  and  number  by  our  experience  of  actual  things,  even 
although  they  themselves  can  and  do  pass  beyond  the  domain  of 
actually  experienced  things.  The  only  necessary  object  of 
thought  is  reality  in  general :  for  the  exercise  of  the  function  of 
thought  necessarily  demands  an  object,  and  this  object  must  be 
reality  of  some  sort.  Thought,  as  we  saw,  begins  with  actual 

6 


82  ONTOLOGY 

reality.  Working  upon  this,  thought  apprehends  in  it  the  founda- 
tions of  those  necessary  relations  and  judgments  already  referred 
to.  Considering,  moreover,  the  actual  data  of  experience,  our 
thought  can  infer  from  these  the  actual  existence  of  one  Being 
Who  must  exist  by  a  necessity  of  His  Essence. 

But,  furthermore,  must  all  the  possible  essences  which  the  mind  does  or 
can  actually  think  of,  be  conceived  as  necessarily  possible  in  the  same  sense 
in  which  it  is  suggested  that  they  must  be  conceived  as  eternally  possible  ? 
To  this  question,  too,  we  shall  return  presently. 

(d)  Finally,  possible  essences  appear  to  the  mind  as  immut- 
able, and  consequently  indivisible.  This  means  simply  that  the 
relations  which  we  establish  between  them  and  their  constitutive 
factors  are  not  only  necessary  but  immutable :  that  if  any  con- 
stitutive factor  of  an  essence  is  conceived  as  removed  from  it,  or 
any  new  factor  as  added,  we  have  no  longer  the  original  essence 
but  some  other  essence.  If  "  animal  "  is  a  being  essentially 
embodying  the  two  objective  concepts  of  "  organism "  and 
"sentient,"  then  on  removing  either  we  have  no  longer  the 
essence  "  animal ".  So,  too,  by  adding  to  these  some  other 
element  compatible  with  them,  e.g.  "  rational,"  we  have  no  longer 
the  essence  "animal,"  but  the  essence  "  man".  Hence  possible 
essences  have  been  likened  to  numbers,  inasmuch  as  if  we 
add  anything  to,  or  subtract  anything  from,  any  given  number, 
we  have  now  no  longer  the  original  number  but  another.1  This, 
too,  is  only  an  expression  of  the  laws  of  identity  and  contradic- 
jjion. 

We  might  ask,  however,  whether,  apart  from  analysis  and  comparison  of 
an  abstract  object  of  thought  with  its  constitutive  notes  or  factors,  such  a 
possible  essence  is  in  itself  immutably  possible.  This  is  similar  to  the  question 
whether  we  can  or  must  conceive  such  a  possible  essence  as  eternally  and 
necessarily  possible. 

15.  GROUNDS  OF  THOSE  CHARACTERISTICS.— In  considering 
the  grounds  or  reasons  of  the  various  characteristics  just  enu- 
merated it  may  be  well  to  reflect  that  when  we  speak  of  the 
intrinsic  possibility  of  a  possible  essence  we  conceive  the  latter  as 
something  complex,  which  we  mentally  resolve  into  its  con- 
stitutive notes  or  factors  or  principles,  to  see  if  these  are  com- 
patible. If  they  are  we  pronounce  the  essence  intrinsically 
possible,  if  not  we  pronounce  it  intrinsically  impossible.  For 

1  C/.  ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.,  L.  viii.,  10 ;  ST.  THOMAS,  In  viii.,  Metaph.,  Lect. 
iii.,  par.  J. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  83 

our  minds,  absence  of  internal  incompatibility  in  the  content 
of  our  concept  of  any  object  is  the  test  of  its  intrinsic  possi- 
bility. Whatever  fulfils  this  test  we  consider  capable  of  ex- 
isting. But  what  about  the  possibility  of  the  notes,  or  factors, 
or  principles  themselves,  whereby  we  define  those  essences,  and 
by  the  union  of  which  we  conceive  those  essences  to  be  con- 
stituted ?  How  do  we  know  that  those  abstract  principles  or 
factors — no  one  of  which  can  actually  exist  alone,  since  all  are 
abstract — can  in  certain  combinations  form  possible  objects  of 
thought  ?  We  can  know  this  only  because  we  have  either  ex- 
perienced such  objects  as  actual,  or  because  we  infer  their  possi- 
bility from  objects  actually  experienced.  And  similarly  our 
knowledge  of  what  is  impossible  is  based  upon  our  experience  of 
the  actual.  Since,  moreover,  our  experience  of  the  actual  is 
finite  and  fallible,  we  may  err  in  our  judgments  as  to  what  essences 
are,  and  what  are  not,  intrinsically  possible.1 

If  now  we  ask  ourselves  what  intelligible  reason  can  we 
assign  for  the  characteristics  just  indicated  as  belonging  to  possible 
essences,  we  must  fix  our  attention  first  of  all  on  the  fundamental 
fact  that  the  human  intellect  always  apprehends  its  object  in  an 
abstract  condition.  It  contemplates  the  essence  apart  from  the 
existence  in  which  the  essence  is  subject  to  circumstances  of  time 
and  place  and  change ;  it  grasps  the  essence  in  a  static  condition 
as  simply  identical  with  itself  and  distinct  from  all  else  ;  it  sees 
the  essence  as  indifferent  to  existence  at  any  place  or  time; 
reflecting  then  on  the  actualization  of  this  essence  in  the  existing 
order  of  things,  it  apprehends  the  essence  as  capable  of  indefinite 
actualizations  (except  in  cases  where  it  sees  some  reason  to 
the  contrary),  i.e.  it  universalizes  the  essence ;  comparing  it  with 
its  constituent  notes  or  elements,  and  with  those  of  other  essences, 
it  sees  and  affirms  certain  relations  (of  identity  or  diversity,  com- 
patibility or  incompatibility,  between  those  notes  or  elements)  as 
holding  good  necessarily  and  immutably,  and  independently  of 
the  actual  embodiment  of  those  notes  or  elements  in  any  object 
existing  at  any  particular  place  or  time.  All  these  features  of 
the  relations  between  the  constituents  of  abstract,  possible 
essences,  seem  so  far  to  be  adequately  accounted  for  by  the  fact 

1  C/.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  pp.  42-3.  How  do  we  know  that  not  only  water 
(H^O)  is  a  possible  essence  but  also  hydrogen  di-oxide  (H2O2)  ?  Because  the 
latter  substance  has  been  actually  formed  by  chemists  (cf.  ROSCOE,  Elementary 
Chemistry,  Lesson  VI.).  Is  hydrogen  tri-oxyde  (H2OS)  a  possible  substance  ?  We 
may  ask  chemists, — and  they  may  not  be  able  to  tell  us  with  any  certainty  whether 
it  is  or  not. 

6* 


84  ONTOLOGY 

that  the  intellect  apprehends  those  essences  in  the  abstract:  the 
data  in  which  it  apprehends  them  being  given  to  it  through 
sense  experience.  What  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  the 
human  intellect  has  this  power  of  abstract  thought,  is  another 
question1.  But  granting  that  it  does  apprehend  essences  in 
this  manner,  we  seem  to  have  in  this  fact  a  sufficient  explanation 
of  the  features  just  referred  to. 

We  have,  however,  already  suggested  other  questions  about 
the  reality  of  those  possible  essences  :  Is  their  possibility,  so  far 
as  known  to  us,  explained  by  our  experience  of  actual  things  ? 
Or  must  we  think  them  as  eternally,  necessarily  and  immutably 
possible  ?  From  the  manner  in  which  we  must  apprehend  them, 
can  we  infer  anything  about  the  reality  of  an  Eternal,  Immut- 
able, Necessary  Intelligence,  in  whose  Thought  and  Essence 
alone  those  essences,  as  apprehended  by  our  minds,  can  find 
their  ultimate  ground  and  explanation  ?  These  are  the  questions 
we  must  now  endeavour  to  examine. 

1 6.  POSSIBLE  ESSENCES  AS  SUCH  ARE  SOMETHING  DISTINCT 
FROM  MERE  LOGICAL  BEING,  AND  FROM  NOTHINGNESS.— 
There  have  been  philosophers  who  have  held  that  the  actual 
alone  is  real,  and  only  while  it  is  actual  ;  that  a  purely  (intrin- 
sically) possible  essence  as  such  is  nothing  real ;  that  the  actual 
alone  is  possible ;  that  the  purely  possible  as  such  is  impossible. 
This  view  is  based  on  the  erroneous  assumption  that  whatever 
is  or  becomes  actual  is  so,  or  becomes  so,  by  some  sort  of  un- 
intelligible fatalistic  necessity.  Apart  from  the  fact  that  it  is 
incompatible  with  certain  truths  of  theism,  such  as  the  Divine 
Omnipotence  and  Freedom  in  creating,  it  also  involves  the 
denial  of  all  real  becoming  or  change,  and  the  assertion  that  all 

1  The  actual  existence  of  a  thinking  mind  is  of  course  a  necessary  condition,  in 
the  actual  order,  for  the  apprehension  of  objects  in  this  abstract  way.  But  such 
existence  is  no  part  of  the  apprehended  object.  That  the  human  mind,  which  is 
itself  finite,  contingent,  allied  with  matter,  and  dependent  on  the  activity  of  cor- 
poreal sense  organs  for  the  objects  of  its  knowledge,  should  nevertheless  have  the 
power  to  apprehend  contingent  realities  apart  from  their  contingent  actual  existence 
in  time  and  space, — is  a  fact  of  the  greatest  significance  as  regards  the  nature  of  the 
mind  itself.  But  if  we  try  to  prove  the  existence  of  God  from  a  consideration  of  the 
nature  and  powers  of  the  human  mind,  our  argument  proceeds  from  the  actual,  and 
is  distinct  from  any  argument  based  exclusively  on  the  nature  and  properties  of 
possible  essences  as  such.  St.  Augustine's  argument  assumes  as  a  fact  that  the 
human  mind  represents  to  itself  possible  essences  as  having  reality  independently 
both  of  its  own  thought  and  of  any  actual  existence  of  such  essences  (C/.  DE 
MUNYNCK,  Praelectiones  de  Dei  Existentia,  p.  23).  But  is  this  a  fact  ?  This  is  the 
really  debatable  point. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  85 

actuality  is  eternal ;  for  if  anything  becomes  actual,  it  was  previ- 
ously either  possible  or  impossible  ;  if  impossible,  it  could  never 
become  actual ;  if  possible,  then  as  possible  it  was  something 
different  from  the  impossible,  or  from  absolute  nothingness. 
Moreover,  the  intrinsically  possible  is  capable  of  becoming  actual, 
and  may  be  actualized  if  there  exists  some  actual  being  with  power 
to  actualize  it ;  but  absolute  nothingness — or,  in  other  words,  the 
intrinsically  impossible — cannot  be  actualized,  even  by  Omni- 
potence ;  therefore  the  possible  essence  as  such  is  something! 
positive  or  real,  as  distinct  from  nothingness.  Finally,  in- 
trinsically possible  essences  can  be  clearly  distinguished  from  one 
another  by  the  mind ;  but  their  negation  which  is  pure  non- 
entity or  nothingness  cannot  be  so  distinguished.  It  is  therefore 
clear  that  possible  essences  are  in  some  true  sense  something 
positive  or  real.  From  which  it  follows  that  nothingness,  in  thlT 
strict  sense,  is  not  the  mere  absence  or  negation  of  actuality,  but 
also  the  absence  or  negation  of  that  positive  or  real  something 
which  is  intrinsic  possibility ;  in  other  words  that  nothingness  in 
the  strict  sense  means  intrinsic  impossibility. 

Even  those  who  hold  the  opinion  just  rejected — that  the 
purely  possible  essence  as  such  has  no  reality  in  any  conceivable 
sense — would  presumably  admit  that  it  is  an  object  of  human 
thought  at  all  events ;  they  would  accord  to  it  the  being  it  has 
from  the  human  mind  which  thinks  it.  It  would  therefore  be  an 
ens  rationis  according  to  this  view,  having  only  the  ideal  being 
which  consists  in  its  being  constituted  and  contemplated  by  the 
human  mind.  That  it  has  the  ideal  being,  the  esse  ideale  or  esse  in- 
tentionale,  which  consists  in  its  being  contemplated  by  the  human 
mind  as  an  object  of  thought,  no  one  will  deny.  But  a  little 
reflection  will  show,  firstly,  that  this  ideal  being  is  something 
more  than  the  ideal  being  of  an  ens  rationis,  of  a  mere  logical 
entity ;  and,  secondly,  that  a  possible  essence  must  have  some 
other  ideal  being  than  that  which  it  has  in  the  individual  human 
mind. 

The  possible  essence  is  not  a  mere  logical  entity;  for  the 
latter  cannot  be  conceived  as  capable  of  existing  apart  from  the 
human  mind,  in  the  world  of  actual  existences  (3),  whereas  the 
former  can  be,  and  is  in  fact,  conceived  as  capable  of  such 
existence.  Its  ideal  being  in  the  human  mind  is,  therefore, 
something  other  than  that  of  a  mere  logical  entity. 

The  ideal  being  which  it  has  in  the  human  mind  as  an  object 


86  ONTOLOGY 

of  thought  is  undoubtedly  derived  from  the  mind's  knowledge 
of  actual  things.  We  think  of  the  essences  of  actually  experienced 
realities  apart  from  their  actual  existence.  Thus  abstracted,  we 
analyse  them,  compare  them,  reason  from  them.  By  these  pro- 
cesses we  can  not  merely  attain  to  a  knowledge  of  the  actual 
existence  of  other  realities  above  and  beyond  and  outside  of  our 
own  direct  and  immediate  intuitional  experience,  but  we  can 
also  form  concepts  of  multitudes  of  realities  or  essences  as  intrin- 
sically possible,  thus  giving  these  latter  an  ideal  existence  in  our 
own  minds.  Here,  then,  the  question  arises :  Is  this  the  only 
ideal  being  that  can  be  ascribed  to  such  essences?  In  other 
words,  are  essences  intrinsically  possible  because  we  think  them 
as  intrinsically  possible  ?  Or  is  it  not  rather  the  case  that  we 
think  them  to  be  intrinsically  possible  because  they  are  intrinsi- 
cally possible?  Does  our  thought  constitute,  or  does  it  not 
rather  merely  discover,  their  intrinsic  possibility?  Does  the 
latter  result  from,  or  is  it  not  rather  presupposed  by,  our  thought- 
•  activity?  The  second  alternative  suggested  in  each  of  these 
questions  is  the  true  one.  As  our  thought  is  not  the  source  of 
their  actuality,  neither  is  it  the  source  of  their  intrinsic  possibility. 
Solipsism  is  the  reductio  ad  absurdum  of  the  philosophy  which 
would  reduce  all  actuality  experienced  by  the  individual  mind  to 
phases,  or  phenomena,  or  self-manifestations,  of  the  individual 
mind  itself  as  the  one  and  only  actuality.  And  no  less  absurd 
is  the  philosophy  which  would  accord  to  all  intrinsically  possible 
realities  no  being  other  than  the  ideal  being  which  they  have  as 
r  the  thought-objects  of  the  individual  human  mind.  The  study 
of  the  actual  world  of  direct  experience  leads  the  impartial  and 
sincere  inquirer  to  the  conclusion  that  it  is  in  some  true  sense  a 
manifestation  of  mind  or  intelligence :  not,  however,  of  his  own 
mind,  which  is  itself  only  a  very  tiny  item  in  the  totality  of  the 
actual  world,  but  of  one  Supreme  Intelligence.  And  in  this  same 
Intelligence  the  world  of  possible  essences  too  will  be  found  to 
have  its  original  and  fundamental  ideal  being. 

17.  POSSIBLE  ESSENCES  HAVE,  BESIDES  IDEAL  BEING,  NO 
OTHER  SORT  OF  BEING  OR  REALITY  PROPER  AND  INTRINSIC 
TO  THEMSELVES. — Before  inquiring  further  into  the  manner  in 
which  we  attain  to  a  knowledge  of  this  Intelligence,  and  of  the 
ideal  being,  of  possible  essences  in  this  Intelligence,  we  may  ask 
whether,  above  and  beyond  such  ideal  being,  possible  essences 
have  not  perhaps  from  all  eternity  some  being  or  reality  proper 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  87 

and  intrinsic  to  themselves ;  not  indeed  the  actual  being  which 
they  possess  when  actualized  in  time,  but  yet  some  kind  of 
intrinsic  reality  as  distinct  from  the  extrinsic  ideal  being,  or 
esse  intentionale,  which  consists  merely  in  this  that  they  are  ob- 
jects of  thought  present  as  such  to  a  Supreme  Intelligence  or  Mind. 

Some    few    medieval    scholastics1    contended    that   possible^,. 
essences  have  from  all  eternity  not  indeed  the  existence  they 
may  receive  by  creation  or  production  in  time,  but  an  intrinsic 
essential  being  which,  by  creation  or  production,  may  be  trans- 
ferred to  the  order  of  actual  existences,  and  which,  when  actual 
existence  ceases  (if  they  ever  receive  it),  still  continues  immu- 
table  and    incorruptible :    what    these    writers    called    the   esse 
essentiae,  as  distinct  from  the  esse  existentiae,  conceiving  it  to  be 
intermediate  between  the  latter  on  the  one  hand  and  mere  ideal 
or  logical  being  on  the  other,  and  hence  calling  it  esse  diminutum 
or  secundum  quid.     Examining  the  question ,  from  the  standpoint 
of  theism,  these  authors  seem  to  have  thought  that  since  God 
understands    these  essences  as  possible   from  all    eternity,  and 
since   this  knowledge  must   have  as  its    term  or  object   some- 
thing real  and  positive,  these  essences  must  have  some  real  and 
proper  intrinsic  being  from  all  eternity :  otherwise  they  would 
be  simply  nothingness,  and  nothingness  cannot  be  the  term  of 
the  Divine  Intelligence.     But  the  obvious  reply  is  that  though 
possible  essences  as  such  are  nothing  actual  they  must  be  distin- 
guished as  realities,  capable  of  actually  existing,  from  absolute 
nothingness  ;  and  that  as  thus  distinguished  from  absolute  nothing- . 
ness  they  are  really  and  positively  intelligible  to  the  Divine  Mind, 
as  indeed  they  are  even  to  the  human  mind.     To  be  intelligible 
they  need    not  have  actual   being.     They  must,  no  doubt,  be 
capable  of  having  actual    being,  in  order  to  be  understood  as 
realities :  it  is  precisely  in  this  understood  capability  that  their 
reality  consists,  for   the    real   includes  not   only  what   actually 
exists  but  whatever  is  capable  of  actual  existence.     Whatever  is 
opposed  to  absolute  nothingness  is  real ;   and  this  manifestly  in- 
cludes not  only  the  actual  but  whatever  is  intrinsically  possible. 
Realities  or  essences  which  have  not  actual  being  have  only 

1  Among  others  Henry  of  Ghent  (f  1293  5  cf-  DE  WULF,  History  of  Medieval 
Philosophy,  pp.  364-6;  KLEUTGEN,  Philosophic  der  Vorzeit,  Dissert,  vi.,  cap.  ii.,  2, 
§§  581-5),  Capreolus  (1380-1444),  certain  Scotists,  and  certain  theosophists  of  the 
thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries,  are  credited  with  this  peculiar  view.  For 
numerous  references,  cf.  URRABURU,  Ontologia,  Disp.  iii.,  cap.  ii.,  art.  v.  pp. 
650-63. 


88  ONTOLOGY 

I  ideal  being ;  and  ideal  being  means  simply  presence  in 
L  mind  as  an  object  of  thought.  Scholastic  philosophers  generally 1 
hold  that  possible  essences  as  such  have  no  other  being  than  this  ; 
that  before  and  until  such  essences  actually  exist  they  have  of 
themselves  and  in  themselves  no  being  except  the  ideal  being 
which  they  have  as  objects  of  the  Divine  Intelligence  and  the 
virtual  being  they  have  in  the  Divine  Omnipotence  which  may 
at  any  time  give  them  actual  existence.  One  convincing  reason 
for  this  view  is  the  consideration  that  if  possible  essences  as  such 
had  from  all  eternity  any  proper  and  intrinsic  being  in  themselves, 
God  could  neither  create  nor  annihilate.  For  in  that  hypothesis 
essences,  on  becoming  actual,  would  not  be  produced  ex  nihilo, 
inasmuch  as  before  becoming  actual  they  would  in  themselves 
and  from  all  eternity  have  had  their  own  proper  real  being ;  and 
after  ceasing  to  be  actual  they  would  still  retain  this.  But  crea- 
tion is  the  production  of  the  whole  reality  of  actual  being  from 
nothingness ;  and  is  therefore  impossible  if  the  actual  being  is 
merely  produced  from  an  essence  already  real,  i.e.  having  an 
eternal  positive  reality  of  its  own.  The  same  is  true  of  annihila- 
tion. The  theory  of  eternally  existing  uncreated  'matter  is  no 
less  incompatible  with  the  doctrine  of  creation  than  \  this  theory 
of  eternally  real  and  uncreated  forms  or  essences. 

Again,  what  could  this  supposed  positive  and  proper  reality 
of  the  possible  essence  be?  If  it  is  anything  distinct  from  the 
mere  ideal  being  of  such  an  essence,  as  it  is  assumed  to  be,  it 
must  after  all  be  actual  being  of  some  sort,  which  would  ap- 
parently have  to  be  actualized  again  in  order  to  have  actual 
existence !  Finally,  this  supposed  eternal  reality,  proper  to 
possible  essences,  cannot  be  anything  uncreated.  For  whatever 
is  uncreated  is  God;  and  since  it  is  these  supposed  proper 
realities  of  possible  essences  that  are  made  actual,  and  constitute 
the  existing  created  universe,  the  latter  would  be  in  this  view  an 
actualization  of  the  Divine  Essence  itself, — which  is  pantheism 
pure  and  simple.  And  neither  can  this  supposed  eternal  reality, 
proper  to  possible  essences,  be  anything  created.  For  such  crea- 
tion would  be  eternal  and  necessary;  whereas  God's  creative 
activity  is  admitted  by  all  scholastics  to  be  essentially  free ;  and 
although  they  are  not  agreed  as  to  whether  "  creation  from  all 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  pp.  652-3,  for  references  ;  among  others,  to  ST.  THOMAS, 
De  Potentia,  q.  3,  art.  i,  ad  2um  ;  art.  7,  ad  io"m  •  art.  5,  argum.  2° ;  ibid.,  ad  2um. 
Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  14,  art.  9;  q.  45,  art.  i;  ibid.,  art.  2,  ad  2«m ;  q.  61,  art.  2 
Corp. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  89 

eternity"  (" creatio  ab  aeterno")  is  possible,  they  are  agreed  that 
it  is  not  a  fact. 

Possible    essences   as    such    are    therefore   nothing   actual.   / 
Furthermore,  as  such  they  have  in  themselves  no  positive  being.   I 
But  they  are  not  therefore  unreal.    They  are  positively  intelligible 
as  capable  of  actual   existence,  and  therefore  as  distinct  from 
logical  entities  or  entia  rationis  which  are  not  capable  of  such 
existence.     They  are  present  as  objects  of  thought  to  mind  ;  and 
to  some  mind  other  than  the  individual  human  mind.     About 
this  ideal  being  which  they  have  in  this  Mind  we  have  now  i 
the  next  place  to  inquire. 

1 8.  INFERENCES  FROM  OUR  KNOWLEDGE  OF  POSSIBLE 
ESSENCES. — We  have  stated  that  an  impartial  study  of  the  actual 
world  will  lead  to  the  conclusion  that  it  is  dependent  on  a  Su- 
preme Intelligence  ;  and  we  have  suggested  that  in  this  Supreme 
Intelligence  also  possible  essences  as  such  have  their  primary  ideal 
being  (16,  17).  When  the  existence  of  God  has  been  established 
— as  it  may  be  established  by  various  lines  of  argument — from 
actual  things,  we  can  clearly  see,  as  will  be  pointed  out  presently, 
that  in  the  Divine  Essence  all  possible  essences  have  the  ultimate 
source  of  their  possibility.  But  many  scholastic  philosophers 
contend  that  the  nature  and  properties  of  possible  essences,  as  ap- 
prehended by  the  human  mind,  furnish  a  distinct  and  conclusive 
argument  for  the  existence  of  a  Supreme  Uncreated  Intelligence.1 
Others  deny  the  validity  of  such  a  line  of  reasoning,  contending 
that  it  is  based  on  misapprehension  and  misinterpretation  of 
those  characteristics. 

All  admit  that  it  is  not  human  thought  that  makes  essences  possible : 
they  are  intelligible  to  the  human  mind  because  they  are  possible,  not  vice 
versa?  For  the  human  mind  the  immediate  source  and  ground  of  their 
intrinsic  possibility  and  characteristics  is  the  fact  that  they  are  given  to  it 
in  actual  experience  while  it  has  the  power  of  considering  them  apart  from 
their  actual  existence. 

1  Among  others,  BALMES  (Fundamental  Philosophy,  bk.  iv.,  ch.  xxvi.),  LEPIDI 
(Ontologia,  quoted  by  De  Munynck,  Praelectiones  de  Dei  Existentia,  Louvain,  1904, 
p.  19) ;  DE  MUNYNCK  (ibid.,  pp.  19-23,  46-7,  75) ;  HICKEY  (Theologia  Naturalis, 
pp.  31-4) ;   DRISCOLL  (God,  pp.  72  sqq.) ;  LACORDAIRE  (God,  p.  21) ;  KLEUTGEN, 
Philosophic  der  Vorzeit,  Dissert,  iv.,  §  476. 

2  Truth  is  not  the  work  of  any  human  intelligence,  says  St.  Augustine,  nor  can 
any  one  arrogate  to  himself  the  right  to  say  "  my  truth,"  or  "  thy  truth,"  but  all 
must  say  simply  "  the  truth  "  :  "  Quapropter,  nullo  modo  negaveris  esse  incommuta- 
bilem  veritatem,  haec  omnia,  quae  incommutabiliter  vera  sunt,  continentem,  quam 
non  possis  dicere  vel  tuam  vel  meam,  vel  cujuscumque  hominis,  sed  omnibus  in- 
commutabilia  vera  cernentibus,  tamquam  miris  modis  secretum  et  publicum  lumen, 
praesto  esse  ac  se  praebere  communiter :  omne  autem  quod  communiter  omnibus 


9o  ONTOLOGY 

But  (i)  are  they  not  independent  of  experienced  actuality,  no  less  than  of 
the  human  mind,  so  that  we  are  forced  to  infer  from  them  the  reality  of  a 
Supreme  Eternal  Mind  in  which  they  have  eternal  ideal  being  ? 

(2)  Is  not  any  possible  essence  (e.g.  "water,"  or  "  a  triangle  ")  so  neces- 
sarily what  it  is  that  even  if  it  never  did  and  never  will  exist,  nay  even  were 
there  no  human  or  other  finite  mind  to  conceive  it,  it  would  still  be  what  it  is 
(e.g.  "  a  chemical  compound  of  oxygen  and  hydrogen,"  or  "  a  plane  rectilinear 
three-sided  figure  ") — so  that  there  must  be  some  Necessarily  Existing 
Intelligence  in  and  from  which  it  has  this  necessary  truth  as  a  possible 
essence  ? l  These  essences,  as  known  to  us,  are  so  far  from  being  grounded  in, 

ratiocinantibus  atque  intelligentibus  praesto  est,  ad  ullius  eorum  proprie  naturam 
pertinere  quis  dixerit?"—  De  Libero  Arbitrio,  lib.  ii.,  ch.  xii.  Cf.  his  striking  ex- 
pression of  the  same  thought  in  his  Commentary,  Super  Genesim  adLitteram,  lib.  ii., 
cap.  vii. :  "  We  may  conceive  the  heavens  and  the  earth,  that  were  created  in  six 
days,  ceasing  to  exist ;  but  can  we  conceive  the  number  '  six '  ceasing  to  be  the 
sum  of  six  units?":  "  Facilius  coelum  et  terra  transire  possunt,  quae  secundum 
numerum  senarium  fabricata  sunt,  quam  effici  possit  ut  senarius  numerus  suis  parti- 
bus  non  compleatur  "  (apud  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  pp.  35-6). 

1  Cf.  BALMES  (Fundamental  Philosophy,  bk.  iv.,  ch.  xxvi.),  who,  analysing  the 
truth  of  the  proposition  "  Two  circles  of  equal  diameters  are  equal,"  as  an  example 
of  the  necessary,  eternal,  immutable  characteristics  of  possible  essences,  goes  so  far 
as  to  write  '(italics  ours) :  "  What  would  happen,  if,  withdrawing  all  bodies,  all 
sensible  representations,  and  even  all  intelligences,  we  should  imagine  absolute  and 
universal  nothing  ?  We  see  the  truth  of  the  proposition  even  on  this  supposition  : 
for  it  is  impossible  for  us  to  hold  it  to  be  false.  On  every  supposition,  our  under- 
standing sees  a  connection  which  it  cannot  destroy  :  the  condition  once  established, 
the  result  will  infallibly  follow. 

"  An  absolutely  necessary  connection,  founded  neither  on  us,  nor  on  the  external 
world,  which  exists  before  anything  we  can  imagine,  and  subsists  after  we  have 
annihilated  all  by  an  effort  of  our  understanding,  must  be  based  upon  something,  it 
cannot  have  nothing  for  its  origin  :  to  say  this  would  be  to  assert  a  necessary  fact 
without  a  sufficient  reason. 

"  It  is  true  that  in  the  proposition  now  before  us  nothing  real  is  affirmed,  but  if 
we  reflect  carefully  we  find  even  here  the  greatest  difficulty  for  those  who  deny  a 
real  foundation  to  pure  possibility.  What  is  remarkable  in  this  phenomenon,  is 
precisely  this,  that  our  understanding  feels  itself  forced  to  give  its  assent  to  a  pro- 
v  position  which  affirms  an  absolutely  necessary  connection  without  any  relation  to  an 
existing  object.  It  is  conceivable  that  an  intelligence  affected  by  other  beings  may 
know  their  nature  and  relations ;  but  it  is  not  so  easy  of  comprehension  how  it  can 
discover  their  nature  and  relations  in  an  absolutely  necessary  manner,  when  it 
abstracts  all  existence,  when  the  ground  upon  which  the  eyes  of  the  understanding 
are  fixed,  is  the  abyss  of  nothing. 

"  We  deceive  ourselves  when  we  imagine  it  possible  to  abstract  all  existence. 
Even  when  we  suppose  our  mind  to  have  lost  sight  of  every  thing,  a  very  easy  sup- 
position, granting  that  we  find  in  our  consciousness  the  contingency  of  our  being, 
the  understanding  still  perceives  a  possible  order,  and  imagines  it  to  be  all  occupied 
with  pure  possibility,  independent  of  a  being  upon  which  it  is  based.  We  repeat,  that 
this  is  an  illusion,  which  disappears  so  soon  as  we  reflect  upon  it.  In  pure  nothing, 
nothing  is  possible  ;  there  are  no  relations,  no  connections  of  any  kind  ;  in  nothing 
there  are  no  combinations,  it  is  a  ground  upon  which  nothing  can  be  pictured. 

11  The  objectivity  of  our  ideas  and  the  perception  of  necessary  relations  in  a 
possible  order,  reveal  a  communication  of  our  understanding  with  a  being  on  which 
is  founded  all  possibility.  This  possibility  can  be  explained  on  no  supposition 
except  that  which  makes  the  communication  consist  in  the  action  of  God  giving  to 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  91 

or  explained  by,  the  things  of  our  actual  experience,  that  we  rather  regard  the 
latter  as  grounded  in  the  former.  Do  we  not  consider  possible  essences  as 
the  prototypes  and  exemplars  to  which  actual  things  must  conform  in  order 
to  be  actual,  in  order  to  exist  at  all  ? l 

(3)  Finally,  the  relations  which  we  apprehend  as  obtaining  between 
them,  we  see  to  be  necessary  and  immutable  relations.  They  embody  neces- 
sary truths  which  are  for  our  minds  the  standards  of  all  truth.  Such  neces- 
sary truths  cannot  be  grounded  either  in  the  contingent  human  mind,  or  in 
the  contingent  and  mutable  actuality  of  the  things  of  our  immediate  ex- 
perience. Therefore  we  can  and  must  infer  from  them  the  reality  of  a 
Necessary,  Immutable  Being,  of  whose  essence  they  must  be  imitations. 

If,  then,  this  ideal  order  of  intrinsically  possible  essences  is  logically  and  ) 
ontologically  prior  to  the  contingent  actualizations  of  any  of  them  (even  though  ; 
it  be  posterior  to  them  in  the  order  of  our  knowledge^  which  is  based  on  I 
actual  experience],  there  must  be  likewise  ontologically  prior  to  all  contingent  { 
actualities  (including  our  own  minds)  some  Necessary  Intelligence  in  whichJ 
this  order  of  possible  essences  has  its  ideal  being. 

19.  CRITICAL  ANALYSIS  OF  THOSE  INFERENCES.— The  validity  of  the 
general  line  of  argument  indicated  in  the  preceding  paragraphs  has  been 
seriously  questioned.  Among  other  criticisms  the  following  points  have  been 
urged  2 : — 

(i)  Actual  things  furnish  the  basis  of  irrefragable  proofs  of  the  existence 
of  God — the  Supreme,  Necessary,  Eternal,  Omniscient,  and  Omnipotent 
Being.  But  we  are  here  inquiring  whether  a  mind  which  has  not  yet  so 

our  mind  faculties  perceptive  of  the  necessary  relation  of  certain  ideas,  based  upon 
necessary  being,  and  representative  of  His  infinite  essence." 

Balmes,  therefore,  does  not  mean  that  we  could  continue  to  see  essences  as 
possible  were  we  to  imagine  withdrawn  not  merely  finite  minds  but  even  the  Divine 
Mind.  In  such  an  absurd  hypothesis,  nothing  would  appear  true  or  false,  possible 
or  impossible.  But  he  contends  that  even  when  we  try  to  think  away  all  minds, 
even  the  Divine  Mind,  we  still  see  possible  essences  to  be  possible.  And  from  this 
he  argues  that,  since  we  have  successfully  thought  away  finite  minds  and  the 
actuality  of  essences,  while  the  possibility  of  these  latter  still  persists,  these  must  be 
grounded  in  the  Mind  of  God,  the  Actual,  Eternal,  Necessary  Being,  where  they 
have  eternal  ideal  being. 

Cf.  DE  MUNNYNCK  (op.  cit.,  pp.  22-3)  :  "  Ponamus  mundum  non  esse,  nee  sup- 
ponamus  Dei  existentiam.  In  nihilo  illo,  omne  ens  actuale  excludens,  remanet 
intacta — hoc  certissime  scimus  ex  objectivo  valore  intellectus  nostri — realitas 
aeterna,  immutabilis,  ordinis  idealis.  [Ilia  realitas  essentiarum,  he  adds  (ibid.,  n.  2), 
independens  ab  omni  actuali  existentia,  atque  ab  omni  actu  intellectus,  est  funda- 
mentum  metaphysicum  realismi  platonici. — Habet  praeterea  mirum  hoc  systema, 
ut  omnes  sciunt,  fundamentum  criteriologicum.]  Essentiae  sunt,  nee  tamen 
existunt.  Ilia  realitas,  praeter  mundum  totum,  praeter  entia  rationis,  indestructi- 
bilis  perseverat,  nee  tamen  actualis  est.  Haec  quomodo  intelligi  possit  nescimus, 
nisi  ponatur  illam  fundari  in  plenitudine  aeterna,  infinita,  absoluta  rov  Esse 
absoluti.  Hoc  ente  supremo  posito,  omnia  lucidissima  se  praebent  intellectui ;  illo 
Deo  optimo — quem  non  possumus,  perspectis  illis  altissimis,  non  adorare — sublato, 
admittendae  sunt  essentiae  rerum  ab  aeterno  reales  sine  actuali  existentia ;  atque 
proinde  quid  non-individuale  est  reale  in  se,  quod  tamen  concipi  non  potest  nisi 
objective  in  mente." 

1  Cf.  ST.  AUGUSTINE,  De  Libero  Arbitrio,  lib.  ii.,  ch.  viii. 

2  Cf.  especially  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  pp.  40-49, 


92  ONTOLOGY 

analysed  actual  being  as  to  see  how  it  involves  this  conclusion,  or  a  mind 
which  abstracts  altogether  from  the  evidence  furnished  by  actual  things  for 
this  conclusion,  can  prove  the  existence  of  such  a  being  from  the  separate 
consideration  of  possible  essences,  their  attributes  and  relations.  Now  it  is 
not  evident  that  to  such  a  mind  possible  essences  reveal  themselves  as  having 
eternal  ideal  being.  Such  a  mind  is,  no  doubt,  conscious  that  it  is  not  itself 
the  cause  of  their  possibility.  But  it  sees  that  actual  things  plus  the  abstract 
character  of  its  own  thought  account  sufficiently  for  all  their  features  as  it 
knows  them.  To  the  question  :  Is  not  their  ideal  being  eternal?  it  can  only 
answer:  That  will  depend  on  whether  the  world  of  actual  things  can  be 
shown  to  involve  the  existence  of  an  Eternal  Intelligence.  Until  this  is 
proved  we  cannot  say  whether  possible  essences  have  any  ideal  being  other 
than  that  which  they  have  in  human  minds. 

(2)  The  actual  things  from  which  we  get  our  concepts  of  possible 
essences  do  not  exist  necessarily.  But,  granted  their  existence,  we  know 
from  them  that  certain  essences  are  de  facto  possible.  They  are  not  neces- 
sarily given  to  us  as  possible,  any  more  than  actual  things  are  necessarily 
given  to  us  as  actual.  Of  course,  when  they  are  thought  of  at  all,  they  are, 
as  objects  of  thought,  necessarily  and  immutably  identical  with  themselves, 
and  related  to  one  another  as  mutually  compatible  or  incompatible,  etc.  But 
this  necessity  of  relations,  hypothetical  as  it  is  and  contingent  on  the  mental 
processes  of  analysis  and  comparison,  involved  as  it  is  in  the  very  nature  of 
being  and  thought,  and  expressed  as  it  is  in  the  principles  of  identity  and 
contradiction,  is  just  as  true  of  actual  contingent  essences  as  of  possible 
essences  ;  *  and  it  is  something  very  different  from  the  sort  of  necessity  claimed 
for  possible  essences  by  the  contention  that  they  must  be  conceived  as  having 
ideal  being  necessarily.  The  ideal  being  they  have  in  the  human  mind  is 
certainly  not  necessary  :  the  human  mind  might  never  have  conceived  these 
possible  essences. 

But  must  the  human  mind  conceive  a  possible  essence  as  having  some 
ideal  being  necessarily  ?  No  ;  unless  that  mind  has  already  convinced  itself, 
from  a  study  of  actual  things,  that  an  Eternal,  Necessary,  Omniscient  In- 
telligence exists  :  to  which,  of  course,  such  essences  would  be  eternally  and 
necessarily  present  as  objects  of  thought.  If  the  human  mind  had  already 
reached  this  conviction  it  could  then  see  that  "  even  if  there  were  no  human  in- 
tellect, things  would  still  be  true  in  relation  to  the  Divine  Intellect.  But  if  both 
intellects  were,  per  impossibile,  conceived  as  non-existent  truth  would  persist 
no  longer."  2  Suppose,  therefore,  that  it  has  not  yet  reached  this  conviction,  or 
abstracts  altogether  from  the  existence  of  God  as  known  from  actual  things  ; 
and  then,  further,  imagines  the  actual  things  of  its  experience  and  all  human 
intellects  and  finite  intellects  of  whatsoever  kind  as  non-existent :  must  it  still 
conceive  possible  things  as  possible  ?  No ;  possibility  and  impossibility, 

1  It  is,  for  example,  just  as  necessarily  and  immutably  true  of  any  actually  exist- 
ing man  that  he  cannot  be  at  the  same  time  existing  and  not  existing  as  it  is  that 
a  man  cannot  be  an  irrational  animal. 

2  "  Unde,  etiamsi  intellectus  humanus  non  esset,  adhuc  res  dicerentur  verae  in 
ordine  ad  intellectum  divinum.     Sed  si  uterque  intellectus,  quod  est  impossibile,  in- 
telligeretur  auferri,  nullo  modo  ratio  veritatis  remaneret." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veri- 
tate,  q.  i.,  art.  ii. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  93 

truth  and  falsity  will  now  have  ceased  to  have  any  meaning.  After  such  at- 
tempted abstraction  the  mind  would  have  before  it  only  what  Balmes  de- 
scribes as  "  the  abyss  of  nothing  ".  And  Balmes  is  right  in  saying  that  the 
mind  is  unable  "  to  abstract  all  existence  ".  But  the  reason  of  the  inability 
is  not,  as  Balmes  contends,  because  when  it  has  removed  actual  things  and 
finite  minds  there  still  remains  in  spite  of  it  a  system  or  order  of  possible 
essences  which  forces  it  to  infer  and  posit  the  existence  of  an  Eternal,  Necessary 
Mind  as  the  source  and  ground  of  that  order.  The  reason  rather  is  because 
the  mind  sees  that  the  known  actual  things,  from  which  it  got  all  its  notions 
of  possible  essences,  necessarily  imply,  as  the  only  intelligible  ground  of  their 
actuality,  the  existence  of  a  Necessary  Being,  in  whose  Intelligence  they 
must  have  been  contained  ideally,  and  in  whose  Omnipotence  they  must  have 
been  contained  virtually,  from  all  eternity.  From  contingent  actuality,  as 
known  to  it,  the  mind  can  argue  to  the  eternal  actuality  of  Necessary  Being, 
and  to  the  impossibility  either  of  a  state  of  absolute  nothingness,  or  of  an 
order  of  purely  possible  things  apart  from  all  actuality. 

(3)  Of  course,  whether  the  mind  has  thus  thought  out  the  ultimate  im- 
plications of  the  actuality  of  experienced  things  or  not,  once  it  has  thought 
and  experienced  those  things  it  cannot  by  any  effort  banish  the  memory  of 
them  from  its  presence  :  they  are  there  still  as  objects  of  its  thought  even 
when  it  abstracts  from  their  actual  existence.  But  if,  while  it  has  not  yet 
seen  that  their  actuality  implies  the  existence  of  a  Necessary,  Omniscient  and 
Omnipotent  Being,  it  abstracts  not  only  from  their  actual  existence  but  from 
the  existence  of  all  finite  minds  (itself  included),  then  in  that  state,  so  far  as  its 
knowledge  goes,  there  would  be  neither  actual  nor  ideal  nor  possible  being. 
Nor  can  the  fact  that  an  ideal  order  of  possible  things  still  persists  in  its  own 
thought  mislead  it  into  concluding  that  such  an  ideal  order  really  persists  in  the 
hypothesis  it  has  made.  For  it  knows  that  this  ideal  order  still  persists  for  itself 
simply  because  it  cannot  "  think  itself  away  ".  It  sees  all  the  time  that  if  it 
could  effectively  think  itself  away,  this  ideal  order  would  have  to  disappear  with 
it,  leaving  nothing — so  far  as  it  knows — either  actual  or  possible.  Mercier  has 
some  apposite  remarks  on  this  very  point.  "  From  the  fact,"  he  writes,  "  that 
those  abstract  essences,  grasped  by  our  abstractive  thought  from  the  dawn  of 
our  reason,  have  grown  so  familiar  to  us,  we  easily  come  to  look  upon  them 
as  pre-existing  archetypes  or  models  of  our  thoughts  and  of  things  ;  they  form 
a  fund  of  predicates  by  which  we  are  in  the  habit  of  interpreting  the  data  of 
our  experience.  So,  too,  the  hypothetically  necessary  relations  established  by 
abstract  thought  between  them  we  come  to  regard  as  a  sort  of  eternal  system 
of  principles,  endowed  with  a  sort  of  legislative  power,  to  which  created  things 
and  intelligences  must  conform.  But  they  have  really  no  such  pre-existence. 
The  eternal  pre-existence  of  those  essence-types,  which  Plato  called  the 
4  intelligible  world,'  the  TOKOS  VOTJTOS,  and  the  supposed  eternal  legislative 
power  of  their  relations,  are  a  sort  of  mental  optical  illusion.  Those  abstract 
essences,  and  the  principles  based  upon  them,  are  the  products  of  our  mental 
activity  working  on  the  data  of  our  actual  experience.  When  we  enter  on 
the  domain  of  speculative  reflection  .  .  .  they  are  there  before  us  ;  ...  but 
we  must  not  forget  that  reflection  is  consequent  on  the  spontaneous  thought- 
activity  which — by  working  abstractively  on  the  actual  data  of  sensible,  con- 
tingent, changeable,  temporal  realities — set  them  up  there.  .  .  .  We  know 


94  ONTOLOGY 

from  psychology  how  those  ideal,  abstract  essence-types  are  formed.  .  .  .  But 
because  we  have  no  actual  memory  of  their  formation,  which  is  so  rapid  as 
practically  to  escape  consciousness  in  spontaneous  thought,  we  are  naturally 
prone  to  imagine  that  they  are  not  the  product  of  our  own  mental  action  on 
the  data  of  actual  experience,  but  that  they  exist  in  us,  or  rather  above  us, 
and  independently  of  us.  We  can  therefore  understand  the  psychological 
illusion  under  which  Plato  wrote  such  passages  as  the  following :  *  But  if 
anyone  should  tell  me  why  anything  is  beautiful,  either  because  it  has  a  bloom- 
ing, florid  colour,  or  figure,  or  anythingelse  of  the  kind,  I  dismiss  all  other  reasons, 
for  I  am  confounded  by  them  all ;  but  I  simply,  wholly,  and  perhaps  naively, 
confine  myself  to  this,  that  nothing  else  causes  it  to  be  beautiful,  except  either 
the  presence  or  communication  of  that  abstract  beauty,  by  whatever  means 
and  in  whatever  way  communicated ;  for  I  cannot  yet  affirm  with  certainty, 
but  only  that  by  means  of  beauty  all  beautiful  things  become  beautiful  (r« 
Ka\a>  TO.  KaXa  yiyverai  /caXa).  For  this  appears  to  me  the  safest  answer 
to  give  both  to  myself  and  others,  and  adhering  to  this  I  think  that  I  shall 
never  fall  [into  error].  .  .  .  And  that  by  magnitude  great  things  become  great, 
and  greater  things  greater;  and  by  littleness  less  things  become  less.'1  St. 
Augustine's  doctrine  on  the  invariable  laws  of  numbers,  on  the  immutable 
principles  of  wisdom,  and  on  truth  generally,  draws  its  inspiration  from  this 
Platonic  idealism."  2 

But  this  Platonic  doctrine,  attributing  to  the  abstract  essences  conceived 
by  our  thought  a  reality  independent  both  of  our  thought  and  of  the  actual 
sense  data  from  which  directly  or  indirectly  we  derive  our  concepts  of  them, 
is  rejected  as  unsound  by  scholastics  generally.  When  we  have  proved  from 
actual  things  that  God  exists,  and  is  the  Intelligent  and  Free  Creator  of  the 
actual  world  of  our  direct  experience,  we  can  of  course  consider  the  Divine 
Intellect  as  contemplating  from  all  eternity  the  Divine  Essence,  and  as  seeing 
therein  the  eternal  archetypes  or  ideas  of  all  actual  and  possible  essences.  We 
may  thus  regard  the  Divine  Mind  as  the  eternal  TOTTOS  VOTJTOS,  or  mundus  in- 
telligibilis.  This,  of  course,  is  not  Plato's  thought ;  it  is  what  St.  Augustine 
substituted  for  Platonism,  and  very  properly.  But  we  must  not  infer,  from 
this  truth,  that  when  we  contemplate  possible  essences,  with  all  the  character- 
istics we  may  detect  in  them,  we  are  contemplating  this  mundus  intelligibilis 
which  is  the  Divine  Mind.  This  was  the  error  of  the  ontologists.  They  in- 
ferred that  since  possible  essences,  as  known  by  the  human  mind,  have  -ideal 
being  independently  of  the  latter  and  of  all  actual  contingent  reality,  the  human 
mind  in  contemplating  them  has  really  an  intuition  of  them  as  they  are  seen 
by  the  Divine  Intellect  Itself  in  the  Divine  Essence ;  so  that,  in  the  words  of 
Gioberti,  the  Primum  Ontologicum^  the  Divine  Being  Himself,  is  also  the 
primum  logicum,  or  first  reality  apprehended  by  human  thought.3 

Now  those  authors  who  hold  that  the  ideal  order  of  possible  essences 
contemplated  by  the  human  mind  is  seen  by  the  latter,  as  so  contemplated, 
to  have  some  being,  some  ideal  being,  really  independent  of  the  human  mind 
itself,  and  of  the  actual  contingent  things  from  which  they  admit  that  the 
human  mind  derives  its  knowledge  of  such  essences, — these  authors  do  not 
hold,  but  deny^  that  this  independent  ideal  being,  which  they  claim  for  these 

1  Phado,  100,  C.  ff.  2MERCiER,  Ontologie,  pp.  45-7. 

3  C/.  DE  MUNNYNCK,  op.  cit.,  pp.  24-5. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE 


95 


essences,  is  anything  Divine,  that  it  is  the  Divine  Essence  as  seen  by  the 
Divine  Intellect  to  be  imitable  ad  extra}-  Hence  they  cannot  fairly  be 
charged  with  the  error  of  ontologism. 

Renouncing  Plato's  exaggerated  realism,  and  holding  that  our  knowledge 
of  the  ideal  order  of  possible  essences  is  derived  by  our  mind  from  its  con- 
sideration of  actual  things,  they  yet  hold  that  this  ideal  order  is  seen  to  have 
some  sort  of  being  or  reality  independent  both  of  the  mind  and  of  actual 
things.2  This  is  not  easy  to  understand.  When  we  ask,  Is  this  supposed 
independent  being  (or  reality,  or  possibility)  of  possible  essences  the  ideal 
being  they  have  in  the  Divine  mind  ? — we  are  told  that  it  is  not ; 3  but  that  it  is 
something  from  which  we  can  infer,  by  reasoning^  this  eternal,  necessary,  and 
immutable  ideal  being  of  these  same  essences  in  the  Divine  Mind. 

The  considerations  urged  in  the  foregoing  paragraphs  will,  however,  have 
shown  that  the  validity  of  this  line  of  reasoning  from  possible  essences  to  the 
reality  of  an  Eternal,  Divine,  Immutable  Intelligence  is  by  no  means  evident 
or  free  from  difficulties.  Of  course,  when  the  existence  of  God  has  been 
proved  from  actual  things,  the  conception  of  the  Divine  Intelligence  and 
Essence  as  the  ultimate  source  of  all  possible  reality,  no  less  than  of  all  actual 
reality,  will  be  found  to  shed  a  great  deal  of  new  light  upon  the  intrinsic  pos- 
sibility of  possible  essences.  Since,  however,  our  knowledge  of  the  Divine  is 
merely  analogical,  and  since  God's  intuition  of  possible  essences,  as  imitations 
of  His  own  Divine  Essence,  completely  transcends  our  comprehension,  and  is 
totally  different  from  our  abstractive  knowedge  of  such  essences,  our  concep- 
tion of  the  manner  in  which  these  essences  are  related  to  the  Divine  Nature 
and  the  Divine  Attributes,  must  be  determined  after  the  analogy  of  the  manner 
in  which  our  own  minds  are  related  to  these  essences. 

20.  ESSENCES  ARE  INTRINSICALLY  POSSIBLE,  NOT  BECAUSE 
GOD  CAN  MAKE  THEM  EXIST  ACTUALLY  ;  NOR  YET  BECAUSE  HE 
FREELY  WILLS  THEM  TO  BE  POSSIBLE  ;  NOR  BECAUSE  HE  UNDER- 
STANDS THEM  AS  POSSIBLE  ;  BUT  BECAUSE  THEY  ARE  MODES  IN 
WHICH  THE  DIVINE  ESSENCE  is  IMITABLE  ad  extra.— (a)  The 
ultimate  source  of  the  extrinsic  possibility  of  all  contingent  realities 
is  the  Divine  Omnipotence  :  just  as  the  proximate  source  of  the 
extrinsic  possibility  of  a  statue  is  the  power  of  the  sculptor  to 
educe  it  from  the  block  of  wood  or  marble.  But  just  as  the 
power  of  the  sculptor  presupposes  the  intrinsic  possibility  of  the 
statue,  so  does  the  Divine  Omnipotence  presuppose  the  intrinsic 
possibility  of  all  possible  things.  It  is  not,  as  William  of  Ockam 
(f  1347),  a  scholastic  of  the  decadent  period,  erroneously  thought, 

1  Cf.  De  MUNNYNCK,  op.  cit.,  pp.  24-5.  2  ibid.,  pp.  22,  24. 

3 "  Quae  objecta  non  divina  esse,  luce  clarius  apparet.  Attamen  ilia  ponderando, 
modumque  inspiciendo  quo  reprcsentantur  a  mente  humana,  atque  praesupponendo 
valorem  objectivum  intellectus,  concludimus  ex  ideis  ad  realitates  illas  quse  in  Esse 
divino  fundantur  .  .  .  ratione  horum  [objectorum  soil,  idearum  nostrarum]  per- 
cipimus,  ope  ratiocinii,  ilia  positive  aeterna  et  immutabilia,  quae  reapse  in  Deitate 
fundantur,  atque  sunt  ipse  Deus  quatenus  imitabilis." — ibid.,  pp.  24-5.  Cf.  extract 
quoted  above,  p.  97  n. 


96  ONTOLOGY 

because  God  can  create  things  that  such  things  are  intrinsically 
possible,  but  rather  because  they  are  intrinsically  possible  He  can 
create  them. 

(3)  Not  less  erroneous  is  the  voluntarist  theory  of  Descartes, 
according  to  which  possible  essences  are  intrinsically  possible  be- 
cause God  freely  willed  them  to  be  possible.1  The  actuality  of 
all  created  things  depends,  of  course,  on  the  free  will  of  God 
to  create  them  ;  but  that  possible  essences  are  what  they  are,  and 
are  related  to  each  other  necessarily  as  they  are,  because  God  has 
willed  them  to  be  such,  is  absolutely  incredible.  Descartes  seems 
to  have  been  betrayed  into  this  strange  error  by  a  false  notion  of 
what  is  requisite  for  the  absolute  freedom  and  independence  of 
the  Divine  Will :  as  if  this  demanded  that  God  should  be  free  to 
will,  e.g.  that  two  plus  two  be  five,  or  that  the  radii  of  a  circle  be 
unequal,  or  that  creatures  be  independent  of  Himself,  or  that 
blasphemy  be  a  virtuous  act !  The  intrinsic  possibility  of  essences 
is  not  dependent  on  the  Free  Will  of  God  ;  the  actualization  of 
possible  essences  is  ;  but  God  can  will  to  actualize  only  such 
essences  as  He  sees,  from  comprehending  His  own  Divine  Es- 
sence, to  be  intrinsically  possible.  But  it  derogates  in  no  way 
from  the  supremacy  of  the  Divine  Will  to  conceive  its  free  volition 
as  thus  consequent  on,  and  illumined  by,  the  Divine  Knowledge  ; 
whereas  it  is  incompatible  with  the  wisdom  and  sanctity  of  God, 
as  well  as  inconceivable  to  the  human  mind,  that  the  necessary 
laws  of  thought  and  being — such  as  the  principles  of  contradiction 
and  identity,  the  principle  of  causality,  the  first  principles  of  the 
moral  order — should  be  what  they  are  simply  because  God  has 
freely  willed  them  to  be  so,  and  might  therefore  have  been  other- 
wise. 

From  the  fact  that  we  have  no  direct  intuition  of  the  Divine  Being,  some 
philosophers  have  concluded  that  all  speculation  on  the  relation  of  God  to 
the  world  of  our  direct  experience  is  necessarily  barren  and  fruitless.  This 
is  a  phase  of  agnosticism  ;  and,  like  all  error,  it  is  the  exaggeration  of  a 
truth  :  the  truth  being  that  while  we  may  reach  real  knowledge  about  the 
Divine  Nature  and  attributes  by  such  speculation,  we  can  do  so  only  on  con- 
dition that  we  are  guided  by  analogies  drawn  from  God's  creation,  and  re- 
member that  our  concepts,  as  applied  to  God,  are  analogical  (2). 

1  ",Non  ideo  voluit  Deus  mundum  creare  in  tempore,  quia  vidit  melius  sic  fore, 
quam  si  creasset  ab  seterno ;  nee  voluit  tres  angulos  trianguli  czquales  esse  duobus 
rectis,  quia  cognovit  aliter  fieri  non  posse.  Sed  contra,  quia  voluit  creare  mundum 
in  tempore,  ideo  sic  melius  est,  quam  bi  creatus  fuisset  ab  aeterno,  et  quia  voluit  tres 
angulos  trianguli  necessatio  equates  esse  duobus  rectis,  idcirco  jam  verum  est,  et 
aliter  fieri  non  potest,  atque  ita  de  reliquis." — DESCARTES,  in  Resp.  ad  Sext.  Objec- 
tiones,  ad  6um  scrupulum. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  97 

"  We  can  know  God  only  by  analogy  with  contingent  and  finite  beings, 
and  consequently  the  realities  and  laws  of  the  contingent  and  finite  world 
must  necessarily  serve  as  our  term  of  comparison.  But,  among  finite  realities, 
we  see  an  essential  subordination  of  the  extrinsically  possible  to  the  intelli- 
gible, of  this  to  the  intrinsically  possible,  and  of  this  again  to  the  essential 
type  which  is  presupposed  by  our  thought.  Therefore,  a  part,  we  must  con-  '. 
sider  the  omnipotent  will  of  God,  which  is  the  first  and  universal  cause  of  all 
[contingent]  existences,  as  under  the  direction  of  the  Divine  Omniscience,  and 
this  in  turn  as  having  for  its  object  the  Divine  Essence  and  in  it  the  essential 
types  whose  intrinsic  possibility  is  grounded  on  the  necessary  instability  of 
the  Divine  Being. 

"  When,  therefore,  in  defence  of  his  position,  Descartes  argues  that  '  In 
God  willing  and  knowing  are  one  and  the  same  ;  the  reason  why  He  knows 
anything  is  because  He  wills  it,  and  for  this  reason  only  can  it  be  true  :  Ex 
hoc  ipso  quod  Deus  aliquid  velit,  ideo  cognoscit,  et  ideo  tantum  talis  res  est 
vera  ' — he  is  only  confusing  the  issue.  We  might,  indeed,  retort  the  argu- 
ment :  '  In  God  willing  and  knowing  are  one  and  the  same  ;  the  reason  why 
He  wills  anything  is  because  He  knows  it,  and  for  this  reason  only  can  it  be 
good  :  Ex  hoc  ipso  quod  aliquid  cognoscit,  ideo  vult^  et  ideo  tantum  talis 
res  est  bonaj  but  both  inferences  are  equally  unwarranted.  For,  though 
willing  and  knowing  are  certainly  one  and  the  same  in  God,  this  one  and  the 
same  thing  is  formally  and  for  our  minds  neither  will  nor  intellect,  but  a 
reality  transcending  will  and  intellect,  a  substance  infinitely  above  any  sub- 
stances known  to  us  :  vTrepovo-ia,  supersubstantia,  as  the  Fathers  of  the  Church 
and  the  Doctors  of  the  Schools  call  it.  But  of  this  transcendent  substance 
we  have  no  intuitive  knowledge.  We  must  therefore  either  abandon  all 
attempts  to  find  out  anything  about  it,  or  else  apprehend  it  and  designate  it 
after  the  analogy  of  what  we  know  from  direct  experience  about  created  life 
and  mind.  And  as  in  creatures  will  is  not  identical  with  intellect,  nor  either 
of  these  with  the  nature  of  the  being  that  possesses  them  ;  so  what  we  con- 
ceive in  God  under  the  concept  of  will,  we  must  not  identify  in  thought  with 
what  we  conceive  in  Him  under  the  concept  of  intellect,  nor  may  we  with 
impunity  confound  either  in  our  thought  with  the  Nature  or  Essence  of  the 
Divine  Being."  x 

(c}  Philosophers  who  deny  the  validity  of  all  the  arguments 
advanced  by  theists  in  proof  of  the  existence  of  a  transcendent 
Supreme  Being,  distinct  from  the  world  of  direct  human  experi- 
ence, endeavour  to  account  in  various  ways  for  the  intrinsic 
possibility  of  abstract  essences.  Agnostics  either  deny  to  these 
latter  any  reality  whatsoever  (16),  or  else  declare  the  problem  of 
their  reality  insoluble.  Monists  of  the  materialist  type — who  try 
to  reduce  all  mind  to  matter  and  its  mere  mechanical  energies 
(n) — treat  the  question  in  a  still  more  inadequate  and  unsatis- 
factory manner ;  while  the  advocates  of  idealistic  monism,  like 
Hegel  and  his  followers,  refer  us  to  the  supposed  Immanent  Mind 

1  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  pp.  58-60. 
7 


98  ONTOLOGY 

of  the  universe  for  an  ultimate  explanation  of  all  intrinsic  possi- 
bility. Certainly  this  must  have  its  ultimate  source  in  some  mind  ; 
and  it  is  not  in  referring  us  to  an  Eternal  Mind  that  these  philo- 
sophers err,  but  in  their  conception  of  the  relation  of  this  mind  to 
the  world  of  direct  actual  experience.  It  is  not,  however,  with  such 
theories  we  are  concerned  just  now,  but  only  with  theories  put  for- 
ward by  theists.  And  among  these  latter  it  is  surprising  to  find 
some  few l  who  maintain  that  the  intrinsic  possibility  of  abstract 
essences  depends  ultimately  and  exclusively  on  these  essences 
themselves,  irrespective  of  things  actually  experienced  by  the 
human  mind,  irrespective  of  the  human  mind  itself,  and  irrespec- 
tive of  the  Divine  Mind  and  the  Divine  Nature. 

As  to  this  view,  we  have  already  seen  (19)  that  if  we  abstract 
from  all  human  minds,  and  from  all  actual  things  that  can  be 
directly  experienced  by  such  minds,  we  are  face  to  face  either 
with  the  alternative  of  absolute  nothingness  wherein  the  true  and 
the  false,  the  possible  and  the  impossible,  cease  to  have  any 
intelligible  meaning,  or  else  with  the  alternative  of  a  Supreme, 
Eternal,  Necessary,  Omniscient  and  Omnipotent  Being,  whose 
actual  existence  has  been,  or  can  be,  inferred  from  the  actual 
data  of  human  experience.  Now  the  theist,  who  admits  the 
existence  of  such  a  Being,  cannot  fail  to  see  that  possible  essences 
must  have  their  primary  ideal  being  in  the  Divine  Intellect,  and 
the  ultimate  source  of  their  intrinsic  possibility  in  the  Divine 
Essence  Itself.  For,  knowing  that  God  can  actualize  intrinsically 
possible  essences  by  the  creative  act,  which  is  intelligent  and  free, 
he  will  understand  that  these  essences  have  their  ideal  being  in 
the  Divine  Intellect ;  that  the  Divine  Intellect  sees  their  intrinsic 
possibility  by  contemplating  the  Divine  Essence  as  the  Un- 
created Prototype  and  Exemplar  of  all  intrinsically  possible 
things ;  and  that  these  latter  are  intrinsically  possible  precisely 
because  they  are  possible  adumbrations  or  imitations  of  the 
Divine  Nature. 

(d)  But  are  we  to  conceive  that  essences  are  intrinsically 
possible  precisely  because  the  Divine  Intellect,  by  understanding 
them,  makes  them  intrinsically  possible  ?  Or  should  we  rather 
conceive  their  intrinsic  possibility  as  antecedent  to  this  act  by 
which  the  Divine  Intellect  understands  them,  and  as  dependent 
only  on  the  Divine  Essence  Itself,  so  that  essences  would  be 

1  URRABURU  (op.  cit.  Disp.  iii.,  cap.  ii.,  §  iii.,  p.  671)  mentions  Wolff,  Leibniz, 
Genuensis  an4  Storchenau  as  holding  this  view. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  99 

intrinsically  possible  simply  because  the  Divine  Essence  is  what 
it  is,  and  because  they  are  possible  imitations  or  expressions  of  it  ? 
Here  scholastics  are  not  agreed. 

Some  1  hold  that  the  intrinsic  possibility  of  essences  is  formally 
constituted  by  the  act  whereby  the  Divine  Intellect,  contemplat- 
ing the  Divine  Essence,  understands  the  latter  to  be  indefinitely 
imi table  ad  extra  ;  so  that  as  the  actuality  of  things  results  from 
the  Fiat  of  the  Divine  Will,  and  as  their  extrinsic  possibility  is 
grounded  in  the  Divine  Omnipotence,  so  their  intrinsic  possibility 
is  grounded  in  the  Divine  Intellect.  The  latter,  by  understanding 
the  Divine  Essence,  would  not  merely  give  an  ideal  being  to  the 
intrinsic  possibility  of  essences,  but  would  make  those  essences 
formally  possible,  they  being  only  virtually  possible  in  the  Divine 
Essence  considered  antecedently  to  this  act  of  the  Divine  Intel- 
lect. Or,  rather,  as  some  Scotists  explain  the  matter,2  this  ideal 
being  which  possible  essences  have  from  the  Divine  Intellect  is 
not  as  extrinsic  to  them  as  the  ideal  being  they  have  from  the 
human  intellect,  but  is  rather  the  very  first  being  they  can  be 
said  formally  to  have,  and  is  somehow  intrinsic  to  them  after  the 
analogy  of  the  being  which  mere  logical  entities,  entia  rationis^ 
derive  from  the  human  mind :  which  being  is  intrinsic  to  these 
entities  and  is  in  fact  the  only  being  they  have  or  can  have. 

Others  3  hold  that  while,  no  doubt,  possible  essences  have 
ideal  being  in  the  Divine  Intellect  from  the  fact  that  they  are 
objects  of  the  Divine  Knowledge,  yet  we  must  not  conceive  these 
essences  as  deriving  their  intrinsic  possibility  from  the  Divine 
Intellect.  For  intellect  as  such  presupposes  its  object.  Just, 
therefore,  as  possible  essences  are  not  intrinsically  possible 
because  they  are  understood  by,  and  have  ideal  being  in,  the 
human  mind,  so  neither  are  they  intrinsically  possible  because 
they  are  understood  by,  and  have  ideal  being  in,  the  Divine 
Mind.  In  order  to  be  understood  actually,  in  order  to  have 
ideal  being,  in  order  to  be  objects  of  thought,  they  must  be  j 
intelligible ;  and  in  order  to  be  intelligible  they  must  be  j 
intrinsically  possible.  Therefore  they  are  formally  constituted 
as  intrinsically  possible  essences,  not  by  the  fact  that  they  are 
understood  by  the  Divine  Intellect,  but  by  the  fact  that  ante- 

1  Among  others,  Liberatore,  Lahousse,  Pesch,  Harper.    Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit., 
ibid. 

2  Dupasquier,  Mastrius  and  Rada,  apud  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  ibid.,  pp.  679-81. 

3  Urraburu,  Schiffini,  Mendive.     Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  ibid.t  p.  671. 

7* 


ioo  ONTOLOGY 

cedently  to  this  act  (in  our  way  of  conceiving  the  matter :  for 
there  is  really  no  priority  of  acts  or  attributes  in  God)  they  are 
already  possible  imitations  of  the  Divine  Essence  Itself. 

This  view  seems  preferable  as  being  more  in  accordance  with 
the  analogy  of  what  takes  place  in  the  human  mind.  The 
speculative  intellect  in  man  does  not  constitute,  but  presupposes 
its  object.  Now,  while  actual  things  are  the  objects  of  God's 
practical  science — the  " scientia  visionis"  which  reaches  what  is 
freely  decreed  by  the  Divine  Will, — possible  things  are  the  objects 
of  God's  speculative  science — the  "scientia  simp  lids  intelligentiae" 
which  is  not,  like  the  former,  productive  of  its  object,  but  rather 
contemplative  of  objects  presented  to  it  by  and  in  the  Divine 
Essence. 

Why,  then,  ultimately  will  the  notions  "  square  "  and  "  circle  " 
not  coalesce  so  as  to  form  one  object  of  thought  for  the  human 
mind,  while  the  notions  "  equilateral  "  and  "  triangle "  will  so 
coalesce?  Because  the  Essence  of  God,  the  Necessary  Being, 
the  First  Reality,  and  the  Source  of  all  contingent  reality,  affords 
no  basis  for  the  former  as  a  possible  expression  or  imitation  of 
Itself;  in  other  words,  because  Being  is  not  expressible  by 
nothingness,  and  a  "  square  circle"  is  nothingness:  while  the 
Divine  Essence  does  afford  a  basis  for  the  latter ;  because 
Necessary  Being  is  in  some  intelligible  way  imitated,  expressed, 
manifested,  by  whatever  has  any  being  to  distinguish  it  from 
nothingness,  and  an  "equilateral  triangle  "  has  such  being  and  is 
not  nothingness. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  add  that  when  we  conceive  the 
Divine  Essence,  contemplated  by  the  Divine  Intellect,  as  contain- 
ing in  itself  the  exemplars  or  prototypes  of  all  possible  things, 
we  are  not  to  understand  the  Divine  Essence  as  the  formal 
exemplar  of  each,  or,  a  fortiori,  as  a  vast  collection  of  such  form- 
ally distinct  exemplars  ;  but  only  as  virtually  and  equivalently 
the  exemplar  of  each  and  all.  We  are  not  to  conceive  that 
possible  essences  are  seen  by  the  Divine  Intellect  imaged  in  the 
Divine  Essence  as  in  a  mirror,  but  rather  as  in  their  supreme 
source  and  principle :  so  that  they  are  faint  and  far  off  reflections 
of  It,  and,  when  actualized,  become  for  us  the  only  means  we 
have,  in  this  present  state,  for  reaching  any  knowledge  of  the 
Deity  :  videmus  nunc  per  speculum} 

1 1  Cor.  xiii.  12, 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE       ://;  IOT 

21.  DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  ESSENCE  AND  EXISTENCE  IN 
ACTUALLY  EXISTING  CONTINGENT  OR  CREATED  BEINGS. — 
Passing  now  from  the  consideration  of  possible  essences  as  such, 
to  the  consideration  of  actually  existing  essences,  we  have  to 
examine  a  question  which  has  given  rise  to  a  great  deal  of 
controversy,  partly  on  account  of  its  inherent  difficulty,  and 
partly  because  of  a  multitude  of  ambiguities  arising  from  con- 
fusion of  thought :  What  is  the  nature  of  the  distinction  between 
essence  and  existence  in  the  actually  existing  things  of  our 
experience  ? 

We  have  seen  already  that  the  concepts  of  essence  and  ex- 
istence are  distinct  from  each  other  (12,  13);  in  other  words, 
that  in  all  cases  there  is  at  least  a  logical  distinction  between  the 
essence  and  the  existence  of  any  being.  We  must,  however, 
distinguish  between  created  or  contingent  beings  and  the 
Uncreated,  Necessary,  Self-Existent  Being.  The  latter  exists 
essentially,  eternally,  by  His  own  Essence,  so  that  in  Him 
essence  and  existence  are  really  identical,  His  essence  informally 
His  Existence;  and,  therefore,  in  thinking  of  His  Essence  we 
cannot  positively  exclude  the  notion  of  existence  or  think  of 
Him  as  non-existent.  The  distinction  between  essence  and 
existence,  which  we  find  in  our  thoughts,  is,  therefore,  when 
applied  to  God,  a  purely  logical  distinction,  due  solely  to  o 
finite  human  mode  of  thinking,  and  having  no  ground  or  basis  or 
reason  in  the  reality  which  is  the  object  of  our  thought.  On 
this  there  is  complete  unanimity  among  scholastic  philo- 
sophers. 

But  while  we  conceive  that  God  actually  exists  by  that 
whereby  He  is  God,  by  His  Essence  Itself,  we  do  not  conceive 
that  any  created  or  contingent  being  exists  by  that  whereby  it 
is  what  it  is,  by  its  essence.  We  do  not,  for  example,  regard 
the  essence  of  Socrates,  whether  specific  or  individual  (that 
whereby  he  is  a  man,  or  that  whereby  he  is  this  man,  Socrates), 
as  that  whereby  he  actually  exists.  In  other  words,  the  essence 
of  the  existing  Socrates,  being  a  contingent  essence,  does  not 
necessarily  demand  or  imply  that  it  actually  exist.  Our  concept 
of  such  an  essence  does  not  include  the  note  of  actual  existence. 
Therefore  if  we  find  such  an  essence  actually  existing  we  con- 
sider this  actually  existing  essence  as  caused  or  produced,  and 
conserved  in  existence,  by  some  other  being,  viz.  by  the 
Necessary  Being :  so  that  if  it  were  not  so  created  and  con- 


TQ2  ONTOLOGY 

served  it  would  be  a  pure  possibility  and  nothing  actual.1  The 
same  difference  between  the  Necessary  Being  and  contingent 
beings  will  be  seen  from  considering  their  existence.  The 
abstract  concept  of  existence  is  rendered  definite  and  determinate 
by  the  essence  which  it  actualizes.  Now  every  finite  essence  is 
of  some  particular  kind ;  and  its  existence  is  rendered  deter- 
jninate  by  the  fact  that  it  is  the  existence  of  a  definite  kind  of 
essence.  The  existence  of  a  contingent  being  we  conceive  as 
the  actuality  of  its  essence ;  and  its  essence  as  a  definite  poten- 
tiality of  existence.  Thus  if  we  conceive  existence  as  a  perfec- 
tion it  is  restricted  by  the  finite  nature  of  the  potentiality  which 
it  actualizes.  But  the  existence  of  the  Necessary  Being  is  the 
plenitude  of  actuality,  an  existence  not  restricted  by  being  the 
existence  of  any  essence  that  is  determinate  because  finite,  but 
of  an  essence  that  is  determinate  by  being  above  all  genera  and 
species,  by  being  infinite,  by  being  Itself  pure  actuality,  in  no 
sense  potential  but  perfectly  and  formally  identical  with  actual 
existence.  While,  therefore,  the  essence  of  the  Necessary  Being 
is  a  necessarily  existing  essence,  that  of  a  contingent  being  is 
not  necessarily  existent,  but  is  conceived  as  a  potentiality  which 
has  been  de  facto  actualized  or  made  existent  by  the  Necessary 
Being,  and  which  may  again  cease  to  be  actually  existent.2  On 
this  too  there  is  unanimity  among  scholastic  philosophers. 

1 "  Ex  hoc  ipso  quod  quidditati  esse  attribuitur,  non  solum  esse,  sed  ipsa  quid- 
ditas  creari  dicitur :  quia  antequam  esse  habeat,  nihil  est,  nisi  forte  in  intellectu 
creantis,  ubi  non  est  creatura,  sed  creatrix  essentia." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Potentia, 
q.  iii.,  art.  v.,  ad  2  urn. 

2  "  Ipsum  esse  competit  primo  agenti  secundum  propriam  naturam  :  esse  enim 
Dei  est  ejus  substantia,  ut  ostensum  est  (C.  G.,  Lib.  i.,  c.  22).  Quod  autem  competit 
alicui  secundum  naturam  suam,  non  convenit  aliis  nisi  per  modum  participationis,  sicut 
calor  aliis  corporibus  ab  igne  [i.e.  as  caused  or  produced  in  them.  C/.  Kleutgen, 
op.  cit.,  Dissert.,  i.,  c.  iii.,  §  61].  Ipsum  igitur  esse  competit  aliis  omnibus  a  primo 
agente  per  participationem  quamdam.  Quod  autem  alicui  competit  per  participa- 
tionem,  non  est  substantia  ejus.  Impossibile  est  igitur  quod  substantia  alterius 
entis  praeter  agens  primum  sit  ipsum  esse.  Hinc  est  quod  Exod.  iii.,  proprium 
nomen  Dei  ponitur  esse  qui  est,  quia  ejus  solius  proprium  est,  quod  sua  substantia 
non  sit  aliud  quam  suum  esse." — ST.  THOMAS,  Contra  Gentes,  L.  ii.,  cap.  52,  n.  7. 

"  Quod  inest  alicui  ab  agente,  oportet  esse  actum  ejus ;  agentis  enim  est  facere 
aliquid  actu.  Ostensum  est  autem  supra,  quod  omnes  aliae  substantiae  habent  esse 
a  primo  agente,  et  per  hoc  ipsae  substantiae  creatae  sunt,  quod  esse  ab  alio  habent. 
Ipsum  igitur  esse  inest  substantiis  creatis  ut  quidam  actus  earum.  Id  autem,  cui 
actus  inest,  potentia  est :  nam  actus  in  quantum  hujusmodi  ad  potentiam  refertur. 
In  qualibet  igitur  substantia  creata  est  potentia  et  actus." — ibid.,  cap.  53,  n.  2. 

"  Omne  quod  recipit  aliquid  ab  alio,  est  in  potentia  respectu  illius  :  et  hoc  quod 
receptum  est  in  eo,  est  actus  ejus  ;  ergo  oportet,  quod  ipsa  forma  vel  quidditas,  quae 
est  intelligentia  {i.e.  a  pure  spirit],  sit  in  potentia  respectu  esse,  quod  a  Deo  recipit, 
et  illud  esse  receptum  est  per  modum  actus,  et  ita  invenitur  actus  et  potentia  in  in- 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  103 

We  distinguish  mentally  or  logically  between  the  essence  of 
an  actually  existing  contingent  being  and  its  existence  ;  consider-^ 
ing  the  former  as  the  potential  principle,  in  relation  to  the  latter/ 
as  the  actualizing  principle,  of  the  contingent  existing  realityA 
But  is  the  distinction  between  such  an  essence  and  its  existence 
something  more  than  a  logical  distinction  ?     Is  it  a  real  distinc- 
tion ?     This  is  the  question  in  dispute.    And  in  order  to  avoid  mis- 
understanding, we  must  be  clear  on  these  two  points  :  firstly,  j 
of  what  essence  and  existence  is  there  question  ?  and  secondly, '• 
what  exactly  are  we  to  understand  by  a  real  distinction  in  this/ 
matter  ? 

22.  STATE  OF  THE  QUESTION. — In  the  first  place,  there  is  no 
question  here  of  the  relation  of  a  possible  essence  as  such  to  ex- 
istence. The  possible  essence  of  a  contingent  being,  as  such,  has 
no  reality  outside  the  Divine  Essence,  Intellect,  Will,  and  Omni-^ 
potence.  Before  the  world  was  created  the  possible  essences  of 
all  the  beings  that  constitute  it  were  certainly  really  distinct  from 
the  actual  existence  of  these  beings  which  do  constitute  the 
created  universe.  On  this  point  there  can  be  no  difference  of 
opinion.  To  contend  that  it  is  on  the  eternal  reality  of  the  pos- 
sible essence  that  actual  existence  supervenes,  when  a  contingent 
being  begins  to  exist,  would  be  equivalent  to  contending  that  it 
is  the  Divine  Essence  that  becomes  actual  in  the  phenomena  of 
our  experience  :  which  is  the  error  of  Pantheism. 

Again,  before  a  contingent  thing  comes  into  actual  existence 
it  may  be  virtually  and  potentially  in  the  active  powers  and 
passive  potentialities  of  other  actually  existing  contingent  things  : 
as  the  oak,  for  instance,  is  in  the  passive  potentiality  of  the  acorn 
and  in  the  active  powers  of  the  natural  agencies  whereby  it  is 
evolved  from  the  acorn ;  or  the  statue  in  the  block  of  marble 
and  in  the  mind  and  artistic  power  of  the  sculptor.  But  neither 
arising  from  a  confusion  of  thought  which  fails  to  distinguish 

telligentiis  [i.e.  pure  spirits],  non  tamen  forma  et  materia  nisi  aequivoce." — De  Ente 
et  Essentia,  cap.  v.  C/.  also  Summa  Theol.,  P.  i.,  q.  iii.,  art.  4 ;  q.  xiii.,  art.  n  ;  q. 
Ixxv.,  art.  5,  ad  4  um.  Quodlibeta,  ii.,  art.  3  ;  ix.,  art.  6.  De  Potentia,  q.  vii.,  art.  2. 
In  Metaph.,  iii.,  Dist.  vi.,  q.  2,  art.  2.  Contra  Gentes,  L.  ii.,  cap.  54,  68.  St.  Thomas 
is  usually  interpreted  as  teaching  that  the  distinction  between  essence  and  existence 
in  created  things  is  a  real  distinction.  But  there  are  some  who  have  been  unable 
to  convince  themselves  that  the  Angelic  Doctor  has  made  his  mind  entirely  clear  on 
the  subject.  Kleutgen,  for  instance,  writes  (op.  cit.,  Dissert,  vi.,  c.  ii.,  §  574,  n.  2) : 
"  In  the  extracts  quoted  above  St.  Thomas  clearly  states  that  the  distinction  made 
by  our  thought  is  based  on  the  nature  of  created  things,  but  not  that  this  distinction 
is  that  which  exists  between  different  parts,  dependent  on  one  another,  each  having 
its  own  proper  being  or  reality." 


104  ONTOLOGY 

is  there  any  question  here  of  the  relation  of  such  potential  being 
or  essence  as  a  thing  has  in  its  causes  to  the  actual  existence  of 
this  thing  when  actually  produced.  Whatever  being  or  essence 
it  has  in  its  active  and  passive  causes  is  certainly  really  distinct 
from  the  existence  which  the  thing  has  when  it  has  been  actually 
produced.  Nor  is  there  any  doubt  or  dispute  about  this  point 
At  the  same  time  much  controversy  is  due  to  misunderstandings 
between  the  essence  as  purely  possible,  the  essence  as  virtually 
or  potentially  in  its  causes,  and  the  essence  as  actually  existing. 
It  is  about  the  distinction  between  the  latter  and  its  existence 
that  the  whole  question  is  raised.  And  it  must  be  borne  in  mind 
that  this  essence,  whether  it  is  really  distinct  from  its  existence 
or  not,  is  itself  a  positive  reality  from  the  moment  it  is  created 
or  produced.  The  question  is  whether  the  creative  or  productive 
act — whereby  this  essence  is  placed  "  outside  its  causes,"  and  is 
now  no  longer  merely  possible,  or  merely  virtual  or  potential  in 
its  causes,  but  something  real  in  itself — has  for  its  term  one  reality, 
or  two  realities,  viz.  the  essence  as  real  subjective  potentiality  of 
existence,  and  the  existential  act  or  perfection  whereby  it  is  con- 
stituted actually  existent.1 

The  question  is  exclusively  concerned  with  the  essence  which 
began  to  exist  when  the  contingent  being  came  into  actual  ex- 
istence, and  which  ceases  to  exist  when,  or  if,  this  being  again 
passes  out  of  actual  existence ;  and  the  question  is  whether  this 
essence  which  actually  exists  is  really  distinct  from  the  existence 
whereby  it  actually  exists.  Finally,  the  question  concerns  the 
essence  and  existence  of  any  and  every  actual  contingent  reality, 
whether  such  reality  be  a  substance  or  an  accident.  Of  course 
it  is  primarily  concerned  with  the  essence  and  existence  of  sub- 
stances ;  but  it  also  applies  to  the  essence  and  existence  of 
accidents  in  so  far  as  these  latter  will  be  found  to  be  really  distinct 
from  the  substances  in  which  they  inhere,  and  to  have  reality 
proper  to  themselves. 

23.  THE  THEORY  OF  DISTINCTIONS  IN  ITS  APPLICATION  TO 
THE  QUESTION. — In  the  next  place,  what  are  we  to  understand  by 
a  real  distinction  in  this  matter?  Ambiguity  and  obscurity  of 
thought  in  regard  to  the  theory  of  distinctions,  and  in  regard  to 
the  application  of  the  theory  to  the  present  question,  has  been 
probably  the  most  fertile  source  of  much  tedious  and  fruitless 
controversy  in  this  connexion. 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  249,  5°. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  105 

Anticipating  what  will  be  considered  more  fully  at  a  later 
stage  (30),  we  must  note  here  the  two  main  classes  of  distinction 
which,    by   reflecting   on    our    thought-processes,    we    discover 
between  the  objects  of  our  thought.     The  real  distinction  is  that"^ 
which  exists  in  things  independently  of  the  consideration  of  our   / 
minds ;  that  which  is  discovered,  but  not  made,  by  the  mind  ;,J 
that  which  is  given  to  us  in  and  with  the  data  of  our  experience. 
For  example,  the  act  of  thinking  is  a  reality  other  than,  and 
therefore  really  distinct  from,  the  mind   that   thinks ;    for  the 
mind  persists  after  the  act  of  thinking  has  passed  away. 

Opposed  to  this  is  the  mental  or  logical  distinction,  which" 
is  the  distinction  made  by  the  mind  itself  between  two  different 
concepts  of  one  and  the  same  reality ;  which  is  not  in  the  reality 
independently  of  our  thought,  but  is  introduced  into  it  by  our  I 
thought,  regarding  the  same  reality  under  different  aspects  or/ 
from  different  points  of  view.     The   mind  never  ^ makes  such  aj 
distinction  without  some  ground  or  reason  for  doing  so. 

Sometimes,  however,  this  reason  will  be  found  exclusively  in 
the  mind  itself — in  the  limitations  of  its  modes  of  thought — ano! 
not  in  the  reality  which  is  the  matter  or  object  of  the  thought. 
The  distinction  is  then  said  to  ^purely  logical  or  mental.  Such 
distinctions  are  entia  rationis,  logical  entities.  An  example  would 
be  the  distinction  between  the  concept  "  man  "  and  the  concept 
"rational  animal,"  or,  in  general,  between  any  definable  object 
of  thought  and  its  definition ;  the  distinction,  therefore,  between 
the  essence  and  the  existence  of  the  Necessary  Being  is  a  purely 
logical  distinction,  for  in  a  definition  it  is  the  essence  of  the  thing 
we  define,  and  existence  is  of  the  essence  or  definition  of  the 
Necessary  Being. 

Sometimes,  again,  the  reason  for  making  a  mental  distinction 
will  be  found  in  the  reality  itself.  What  is  one  and  the  same 
reality  presents  different  aspects  to  the  mind  and  evokes  different 
concepts  of  itself  in  the  mind :  though  really  one,  it  is  virtually 
manifold  ;  and  the  distinction  between  the  concepts  of  these 
various  aspects  is  commonly  known  as  a  virtual  distinction^^ 
For  example,  when  we  think  of  any  individual  man  as  a 
"rational  animal,"  though  our  concept  of  "animal  nature"  is 
distinct  from  that  of  "  rational  nature,"  we  do  not  regard  these  in 
him  as  two  realities  co-existing  or  combining  to  form  his  human 
nature,  but  only  as  two  distinct  aspects  under  which  we  view  the 
one  reality  which  is  his  human  nature.  And  we  view  it  under 


106  ONTOLOGY 

these  two  aspects  because  we  have  actual  experience  of  instances 
in  which  animal  nature  is  really  distinct  and  separated  from 
rationality,  e.g.,  in  the,  brute  beast.  Or,  again,  since  we  can  recog- 
nize three  grades  of  life  in  man — vegetative,  sentient,  and 
rational — we  conceive  the  one  principle  of  life,  his  soul,  as  virtu- 
ally three  principles  ;  and  so  we  distinguish  mentally  or  virtually 
between  three  souls  in  man,  although  in  reality  there  is  only  one. 
Or,  once  more,  when  we  think  of  the  Wisdom,  the  Will,  and  the 
Omnipotence  of  God,  we  know  that  although  these  concepts 
represent  different  aspects  of  the  Deity,  these  aspects  are  not 
distinct  realities  in  Him  ;  but  that  because  of  His  infinite  perfec- 
tion and  infinite  simplicity  they  are  all  objectively  one  and  the 
same  self-identical  reality. 

A  virtual  distinction  is  said  to  be  imperfect  (thus  approaching 
nearer  to  the  nature  of  a  purely  logical  distinction)  when  each  of 
the  concepts  whereby  we  apprehend  the  same  reality  only  pre- 
scinds explicitly  from  what  is  expressed  by  the  other,  although 
one  of  them  is  found  on  analysis  to  include  implicitly  what  is 
expressed  by  the  other.  Such  is  the  distinction  between  the 
being  and  the  life  of  any  living  thing ;  or  the  distinction  between 
the  spirituality  and  the  immortality  of  the  human  soul ;  or  the 
distinction  between  Infinite  Wisdom  and  Infinite  Power :  the  dis- 
tinction between  the  divine  attributes  in  general.  A  virtual  dis-' 
tinction  is  said  to  be  perfect  (thus  approaching  nearer  to  the 
nature  of  a  real  distinction)  when  neither  of  the  concepts 
includes  either  explicitly  or  implicitly  what  is  expressed  by  the 
other.  Such,  for  instance,  is  the  distinction  between  the  principle 
of  intellectual  life  and  the  principle  of  animal  or  sentient  life  in 
man  ;  for  not  only  can  these  exist  separately  (the  former  with- 
out the  latter,  e.g.  in  pure  spirits,  the  latter  without  the  former, 
e.g.  in  brute  beasts),  but  also  it  will  be  found  that  by  no  analysis 
does  either  concept  in  any  way  involve  the  other.1 

Our  only  object  in  setting  down  the  various  examples  just 
given  is  to  illustrate  the  general  scholastic  teaching  on  the 
doctrine  of  distinction.  In  themselves  they  are  not  beyond 
dispute,  for  the  general  doctrine  of  distinction  is  not  easy  of 
application  in  detail  ;  but  they  will  be  sufficient  for  our  present 
purpose.  Probably  the  greatest  difficulty  in  applying  the  general 
doctrine  will  be  found  to  lie  in  discriminating  between  virtual 
distinctions — especially  perfect  virtual  distinctions — and  real  dis- 

1  Cf.  REINSTADLER,  Ontologia,  lib.  ii.,  cap.  i.,  art.  ii.,  §  2. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  107 

tinctions.1  And  this  difficulty  will  be  appreciated  still  more  when 
we  learn  that  a  real  distinction  does  not  necessarily  involve 
separability  of  the  objects  so  distinguished.  In  other  words  there 
may  be,  in  a  composite  existing  individual  being,  constitutive 
factors  or  principles,  or  integral  parts,  each  of  which  is  a  positive 
real  entity,  really  distinct  from  the  others,  and  yet  incapable  of 
existing  separately  or  in  isolation  from  the  others.  "Separa- 
bility," says  Mercier,2  "  is  one  of  the  signs  of  a  real  distinction  ; 
but  it  is  neither  essential  to,  nor  a  necessary  property  of  the  latter. 
Two  separable  things  are  of  course  really  distinct  from  each 
other ;  but  two  entities  may  be  really  distinct  from  each  other 
without  being  separable  or  capable  of  existing  apart  from  each 
other.  Thus  we  believe  that  the  intellect  and  the  will  in  man 
are  really  distinct  from  each  other,  and  both  alike  from  the  sub-  / 
stance  of  the  human  soul ;  yet  they  cannot  exist  isolated  from  j 
the  soul."  Therefore,  even  though  the  objects  which  we  appfe^ 
hend  as  distinct,  by  means  of  distinct  concepts,  be  understood  to 
be  such  that  they  cannot  actually  exist  in  isolation  from  each 
other,  but  only  as  united  in  a  composite  individual  being,  still  if 
it  can  be  shown  that  each  of  them  has  its  own  proper  reality  in- 
dependently of  our  thought,  so  that  the  distinction  between  them 
is  not  the  result  of  our  thought,  or  introduced  by  our  thought 

into  the  individual  thing  or  being  which  we  are  considering,  then 

the  distinction  must  be  regarded  as  real.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
it  can  be  shown  that  the  different  aspects  which  we  apprehend  in 
any  datum  by  means  of  distinct  concepts  have  not,  apart  from 
the  consideration  of  the  mind,  apart  from  the  analytic  activity 
of  our  own  thought,  each  its  own  proper  reality,  but  are  only 
distinct  mental  views  of  what  is  objectively  one  and  the  same 
reality,  then  the  distinction  must  be  regarded  as  logical,  not  real, 
— and  this  even  although  there,  may  be  in  the  richness  and  fulness 
of  that  one  reality  comparatively  to  the  limited  capacity  of  our 
minds,  as  well  as  in  the  very  constitution  and  modes  of  thought 
of  our  minds  themselves,  a  reason  or  basis  for,  and  an  explana- 
tion of,  the  multiplicity  of  concepts  whereby  we  attain  to  an  under- 
standing of  some  one  reality. 

24.    SOLUTIONS  OF    THE    QUESTION. — Postponing  further 

1  Zigliara  (Ontologia  (14),  iii.  iv.)  gives  the  virtual  distinction  as  a  sub-class  of 
the  real  distinction  ;  adding,  however  (according  to  Goudin,  Metaph.,  Disp.  i.,  q.  iii. 
art.  ii.,  §  i)  that "  this  virtual  distinction  is  not  so  much  a  [real]  distinction  as  the  basis 
of  a  [mental]  distinction  ". 

2o/>.  cit.t  p.  no. 


io8  ONTOLOGY 

consideration  of  the  serious  problems  on  the  validity  of  know- 
ledge and  its  relation  to  reality,  to  which  those  reflections 
inevitably  give  rise,  let  us  now  return  to  the  main  question : 
the  nature  of  the  distinction  between  the  essence  and  the  exis- 
tence of  any  actually  existing  contingent  being.  We  need  not 
\  be  surprised  to  find  that  the  greatest  minds  have  been  unable  to 
reach  the  same  solution  of  this  question.  For  it  is  but  a  phase 
of  the  more  general  metaphysical  problem — at  once  both 
ontological  and  epistemological — of  the  nature  of  reality  and  the 
relation  of  the  human  mind  thereto.  Nor  will  any  serious 
modern  philosopher  who  is  at  all  mindful  of  the  wealth  of 
current  controversial  literature  on  this  very  problem,  or  of  the 
endless  variety  of  conflicting  opinions  among  contemporary 
thinkers  in  regard  to  it,  be  disposed  to  ridicule  the  medieval 
controversies  on  the  doctrine  of  distinction  as  applied  to  essence 
and  existence.  No  doubt  there  has  been  a  good  deal  of  mere 
verbal,  and  perhaps  trifling,  argumentation  on  the  matter :  it 
lends  itself  to  the  dialectical  skill  of  the  controversialist  who 
"  takes  sides,"  as  well  as  to  the  serious  thought  of  the  open- 
minded  investigator.  It  is  not,  however,  through  drawing 
different  conclusions  from  the  same  premisses  that  conflicting 
solutions  of  the  question  have  been  reached,  but  rather  through 
fundamentally  different  attitudes  in  regard  to  the  premisses 
themselves  which  different  philosophers  profess  to  find  in  the 
common  data  of  their  experience.  When  we  have  once  grasped 
what  philosophers  mean  by  a  logical  or  a  real  distinction  as 
applied  to  the  relation  between  essence  and  existence  we  shall 
not  get  any  very  material  assistance  towards  the  choice  of  a  solu- 
tion by  considering  at  length  the  arguments  adduced  on  either 
side.1 

Those  who  believe  there  is  a  real  distinction2  between  the 
essence  and  the  existence  of  all  actually  existing  contingent 
beings  mean  by  this  that  the  real  essence  which  comes  into 

1  These  may  be  seen  in  abundance  in  the  works  of  any  of  the  scholastic  writers, 
medieval  or  modern,  who  discuss  the  question.     C/.,  e.g.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §§ 
251-4. 

2  Besides  St.  Thomas  (cf.  supra,  p.  102,  n.  2),  Albertus  Magnus  (1193-1280), 
Aegidius  Romanus  (f  circa  1300),  Capreolus  (1380-1444),  Soncinas  (f  1494),  Cajetan 
(1468-1534),  Sylvester  Ferrariensis  (1474-1528),  Dominicus  Banez  (1528-1604),  John 
of  St.  Thomas  (1589-1644),  Goudin  (1639-95),  are  among  the  most  noted  scholastics 
to  hold  this  view.     It  is  supported  by  the  members  of  the  Dominican  Order  gener- 
ally ;  and  by  not  a  few  Jesuits  among  recent  scholastic  writers ;  also  by  MERCIKR, 
op.  cit.,  §§  48-51. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  109 

actual  existence  by  creation,  or  by  the  action  of  created  causes, 
is  a  reality  distinct  from  the  existence  whereby  it  actually 
exists.  The  actually  existing  essence  is  the  total  term  of  the 
creative  or  productive  act ;  but  what  we  apprehend  in  it  under 
the  concept  of  essence  is  really  distinct  from  what  we  apprehend 
in  it  under  the  concept  of  existence :  the  existence  being  a  real 
principle  which  actualizes  the  essence,  and  this  latter  being  itself 
another  real  principle  which  is  in  itself  a  positive,  subjective 
potentiality  of  existence.1  Neither,  of  course,  can  actually  exist 
without  the  other :  no  actual  existence  except  that  of  a  real 
essence ;  no  existing  essence  except  by  reason  of  the  existence 
which  makes  it  actual.  But  these  two  real  principles  of  existing 
contingent  being,  inseparable  as  they  are  and  correlative,  are  / 
nevertheless  distinct  realities — distinct  in  the  objective  order  and  / 
independently  of  our  thought, — and  form  by  their  union  a  really 
composite  product :  the  existing  thing. 

We  might  attempt  to  illustrate  this  by  the  analogy  of  a  body  and  its 
shape  or  colour.  The  body  itself  is  really  distinct  fiom  its  actual  shape  and 
colour :  it  may  lose  them,  and  yet  remain  the  same  body ;  and  it  may 
acquire  other  shapes  and  colours.  At  any  time  the  body  has  actually  some 
particular  shape  and  colour  ;  but  that  by  which  it  is  formally  so  shaped  and 
coloured  is  something  really  different  from  the  body  itself.  Furthermore, 
before  the  body  actually  possessed  this  particular  shape  and  colour,  these 
were  in  it  potentially :  that  is  to  say,  there  were  then  in  the  body  the  real, 
passive,  subjective  potentialities  of  this  particular  shape  and  colour.  So  too 
that  by  which  a  real  (contingent)  essence  actually  exists  (i.e.  the  existential 
act,  existence)  is  really  distinct  from  that  which  actually  exists  (i.e.  the 
essence,  the  potentiality  of  that  existential  act).  The  analogy  is,  however,  at 
best  only  a  halting  one.  For  while  it  is  comparatively  easy  to  understand 
how  the  passive,  subjective  potentiality  of  a  shape  or  colour  can  be  something 
real  in  the  already  actually  existing  body,  it  is  not  so  easy  to  understand 
how  the  potentiality  of  existence,  i.e.  the  real  essence,  can  be  anything  that 
is  itself  real  and  really  distinct  from  the  existence.2  The  oak  is  really  in  the 
acorn,  for  the  passive,  subjective  potentiality  of  the  oak  is  in  the  actual  acorn  ; 
but  is  this  potentiality  anything  really  distinct  from  the  acorn  ?  or  should  we 
not  rather  say  that  the  actual  acorn  is  potentially  the  oak,  or  is  the  potentiality 
of  the  oak  ?  At  all  events  even  if  it  is  really  distinct  from  the  actual  acorn, 
it  is  in  the  actual  acorn.  But  is  it  possible  to  conceive  a  real,  subjective 
potentially  which  does  not  reside  in  anything  actual?3  Now  if  the  real 
essence  is  really  distinct  from  its  existence  it  must  be  conceived  as  a  real, 
subjective  potentiality  of  existence.  Yet  it  cannot  be  conceived  as  a 
potentiality  in  anything  actual  :  except  indeed  in  the  actually  existing  essence 
which  is  the  composite  result  of  its  union  with  the  existential  act.  It  is  not  a 

1  C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  575.  2  ibid.,  §  577. 

3C/.  URRABURU,  op.  dt.,  Disp.  iv.,  cap.  i.,  art.  2,  pp.  730-31. 


no  ONTOLOGY 

real,  subjective  potentiality  antecedently  to  the  existential  act,  and  on  which 
the  latter  is,  as  it  were,  superimposed : l  in  itself,  it  is,  in  fact,  nothing  real 
except  as  actualized  by  the  latter  ;  but,  as  we  have  already  observed,  the 
process  of  actualization,  whether  by  direct  creation  or  by  the  action  of  created 
causes,  must  be  conceived  as  having  for  its  total  term  or  effect  a  composite 
reality  resulting  from  what  we  can  at  best  imperfectly  describe  as  the  union  of 
two  correlative,  con-created,  or  co-produced  principles  of  being,  a  potential 
and  an  actual,  really  distinct  from  each  other :  that  whereby  the  thing  can 
exist,  the  potentiality  of  existence,  the  essence  ;  and  that  whereby  the  thing 
does  exist,  the  actuality  of  essence,  the  existence.  The  description  is  im- 
perfect because  these  principles  are  not  con-created  or  co-produced  separ- 
ately; but,  rather,  the  creation  or  production  of  an  existing  essence,  the 
efficiency  by  which  it  is  "  placed  outside  its  causes,"  has  one  single,  though 
composite,  term  :  the  actually  existing  thing. 

This  view,  thus  advocating  a  real  distinction  between  essence 
and  existence,  may  obviously  be  regarded  as  an  emphatic  ex- 
pression of  the  objective  validity  of  intellectual  knowledge.  It 
might  be  regarded  as  an  application  of  the  more  general  view 
that  the  objective  concepts  between  which  the  intellect  distin- 
guishes in  its  interpretation  of  reality  should  be  regarded  as  re- 
presenting distinct  realities,  except  when  the  distinction  is  seen 
to  arise  not  from  the  nature  of  the  object  but  from  the  nature  of  the 
subject,  from  the  limitations  and  imperfections  of  our  own  modes 
of  thought.  But  in  the  case  of  any  particular  (disputed)  distinction, 
the  onus  probandi  should  lie  rather  on  the  side  of  those  who  contend 
that  such  distinction  is  logical,  and  not  real.  On  the  other  hand, 
many  philosophers  who  are  no  less  firmly  convinced  of  the  objective 
validity  of  intellectual  knowledge  observe  that  it  is  possible  to  push 
this  principle  too  far,  or  rather  to  err  by  excess  in  its  application. 
Instead  of  placing  the  burden  of  proof  solely  on  the  side  of  the 
logical  distinction,  they  would  place  it  rather  more  on  the  side 
of  the  real  distinction — in  conformity  with  the  maxim  of  method, 
Entia  non  sunt  multiplicanda  praeter  necessitate™.  And  they 
think  that  it  is  an  error  by  excess  to  hold  the  distinction  between 
essence  and  existence  to  be  real.  This  brings  us  to  the  second 
alternative  opinion :  that  the  distinction  in  question  is  not  real, 
but  only  virtual.2 

1 "  Esse  rei  quamvis  sit  aliud  ab  ejus  essentia,  non  tamen  est  intelligendum, 
quod  sit  aliquod  superadditum,  ad  modum  accidentis,  sed  quasi  constituitur  per 
principia  essentiae.  Et  ideo  hoc  nomen,  quod  imponitur  ab  esse  (ens)  significat 
idem  cum  nomine  quod  imponitur  ab  ipsa  essentia." — ST.  THOMAS,  In  Metaph., 
L.  iv.,  1.  2. 

2  Among  the  advocates  of  this  view  are  Alexander  of  Hales  (t  1245),  Aureolus 
(t  1322),  Durandus  (f  1332),  Gabriel  Biel  (t  1495),  Suarez  (1548-1617),  oletus 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  in 

According  to  this  view,  the  essence  and  the  existence  of  any 
existing  contingent  being  are  one  and  the  same  reality.  There 
is,  however,  in  this  reality  a  basis  for  the  two  distinct  objective 
concepts — of  essence  and  of  existence — whereby  we  apprehend  it. 
For  the  contingent  being  does  not  exist  necessarily  :  we  see  such 
beings  coming  into  existence  and  ceasing  to  exist :  we  can  there- 
fore think  of  what  they  are  without  thinking  of  them  as  actually 
existent :  in  other  words,  we  can  think  of  them  as  possible,  and 
of  their  existence  as  that  by  which  they  become  actual.  This 
is  a  sufficient  reason  for  distinguishing  mentally,  in  the  existing 
being,  the  essence  which  exists  and  the  existence  by  which  it  ex- 
ists.1 But  when  we  think  of  the  essence  of  an  actually  existing 
being  as  objectively  possible,  or  as  potential  in  its  causes,  we  are 
no  longer  thinking  of  it  as  anything  real  in  itself,  but  only  of  its 
ideal  being  as  an  object  of  thought  in  our  minds,  or  of  the  ideal 
being  it  has  in  the  Divine  Mind,  or  of  the  potential  being  it 
has  in  created  causes,  or  of  the  virtual  being  it  has  in  the  Divine 
Omnipotence,  or  of  the  ultimate  basis  of  its  possibility  in  the 
Divine  Essence.  But  all  these  modes  of  "being"  we  know  to] 
be  really  distinct  from  the  real,  contingent  essence  itself  which 
begins  to  exist  actually  in  time,  and  may  cease  once  more  to 
exist  in  time  when  and  if  its  own  nature  demands,  and  God 
wills,  such  cessation.  But  that  the  real,  contingent  essence  itself 
which  so  exists,  is  something  really  distinct  from  the  existence 
whereby  it  exists ;  that  it  forms  with  the  latter  a  really  com- 
posite being ;  that  it  is  in  itself  a  real,  subjective  potentiality, 
receptive  of  existence  as  another  and  actualizing  reality,  really 
distinct  from  it,  so  that  the  creation  or  production  of  any  single 
actually  existing  contingent  being  would  have  for  its  term  two 
really  distinct  principles  of  being,  a  potential  and  an  actual, 
essence  and  existence,  created  or  produced  per  modum  unius^  so 
to  speak  :  for  asserting  all  this  it  is  contended  by  supporters  of 

(1532-1596),  Vasquez  (1551-1604),  Gregory  of  Valentia  (\rcirca  1600),  and  the 
Jesuits  generally :  some  few  regarding  the  distinction  as  purely  logical,  e.g.  Franzelin 
(apud  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  47,  p.  no,  n.  2).  For  details  and  arguments  on  both 
sides,  cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  Disp.  iv.,  cap.  i.,  art.  2. 

1 "  Compositum  ex  esse  et  essentia  dicitur  de  ratione  entis  creati  secundum  funda- 
mentum,  quod  in  ipso  ente  create  habet ;  hoc  autem  fundamentum  non  est  aliud 
nisi  quia  creatura  non  habet  ex  se  actu  existere,  sed  tantum  est  ens  potentiale,  quod 
ab  alio  potest  esse  participare :  nam  hinc  fit,  ut  essentia  creaturae  concipiatur  a 
nobis  ut  potentiale  quid,  esse  vero  ut  modus  seu  actus,  quo  talis  essentia  ens  in  actu 
constituitur." — SUAREZ,  Metaph.,  Disp.  xxxi.,  §  13. 


ii2  ONTOLOGY 

the  virtual  distinction  that  we  have  no  sufficient  justifying  reason.1 
Hence  they  conclude  that  a  real  distinction  must  be  denied : 
Entia  non  sunt  multiplicanda  praeter  necessitate™,. 

Though  each  of  these  opinions  has  been  defended  with  a  great  deal  of 
ability,  and  an  exhaustive  array  of  arguments,  a  mere  rehearsal  of  these  latter 
would  not  give  much  material  assistance  towards  a  solution  of  the  question. 
We  therefore  abstain  from  repeating  them  here.  There  are  only  a  few  points 
in  connexion  with  them  to  which  attention  may  be  directed. 

In  the  first  place,  some  defenders  of  the  real  distinction  urge  that  were 
the  distinction  not  real,  things  would  exist  essentially,  i.e.  necessarily  ;  and  thus 
the  most  fundamental  ground  of  distinction  between  God  and  creatures,  be- 
tween the  Necessary  Being  and  contingent  beings,  would  be  destroyed  : 
creatures  would  be  no  longer  in  their  very  constitution  composite,  mixtures  of 
potentiality  and  actuality,  but  would  be  purely  actual,  absolutely  simple  and, 
in  a  word,  identical  with  the  Infinite  Being  Himself.  Supporters  of  the 
virtual  distinction  deny  that  those  very  serious  consequences  follow  from  their 
view.  They  point  out  that  though  the  existence  of  the  creature  is  really 
identical  with  its  essence,  the  essence  does  not  exist  necessarily  or  a  se  ;  the 
whole  existing  essence  is  ab  alio,  is  caused,  contingent ;  and  the  funda- 
mental distinction  between  such  a  being  and  the  Self-Existing  Being  is  in 
this  view  perfectly  clear.  Nor  is  the  creature,  they  contend,  purely  actual 
and  absolutely  simple  ;  it  need  not  have  existed,  and  it  may  cease  to  exist ; 
it  has,  therefore,  a  potentiality  of  non-existence,  which  is  inconceivable  in  the 
case  of  the  Necessary  and  purely  Actual  Being ;  it  is,  therefore,  mutable  as 
regards  existence  ;  besides  which  the  essences  even  of  the  most  simple  created 
beings,  namely  pure  spirits,  are  composite  in  the  sense  that  they  have 
faculties  and  operations  really  distinct  from  their  substance. 

Secondly,  it  is  alleged  by  some  defenders  of  the  real  distinction  that  this 
latter  view  of  the  nature  of  existing  contingent  reality  is  a  cardinal  doctrine 
in  the  whole  philosophical  system  of  St.  Thomas,  and  of  scholastics  generally  : 
so  fundamental,  in  fact,  that  many  important  doctrines,  unanimously  held  to 
be  true  by  all  scholastics,  cannot  be  successfully  vindicated  apart  from  it.2 
To  which  it  is  replied  that  there  are  no  important  truths  of  scholastic  philosophy 
which  cannot  be  defended  quite  adequately  apart  altogether  from  the 
view  one  may  hold  on  the  present  question ;  and  that,  this  being  the 
case,  it  is  unwise  to  endeavour  to  base  admittedly  true  doctrines,  which 

1  When  we  speak  of  an  essence  as  receiving  existence,  we  do  not  necessarily 
imply  a  real  distinction  between  receiver  and  received  :  "  Non  est  imaginandum  quod 
una  res  sit,  quae  participat  sicut  essentia,  et  alia  quae  participatur  sicut  esse,  sed 
quia  una  et  eadem  res  est  realitas  modo  participate  et  per  vim  alterius  sicut  per  vim 
agentis :  haec  enim  realitas  de  se  non  est  nisi  sub  modo  possibili ;  quod  autem  sit 
et  vocari  possit  actus,  hoc  habet  per  vim  agentis." — ALEXANDER  OF  HALES,  In 
Metaph.,  L.  vii.,  text  22.    "  Non  omne  acceptum,"  writes  St.  Thomas,  "  est  receptum 
in  aliquo  subjecto;  alioquin  non  posset  dici  quod  tota  substantia  rei  creatae  sit 
accepta  a  Deo,  cum  totius  substantiae  non  sit  aliquod  subjectum  receptivum  "- 
Summa  TheoL,  I.,  q.  xxvii.,  art.  ii.,  ad.  3um. 

2  Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.t  §  49.     Some  of  these  doctrines  we  shall  examine  later, 
by  way  of  illustration,  in  connexion  with  the  Unity  of  being. 


EXISTENCE  AND  ESSENCE  113 

can  be  better  defended  otherwise,  upon  an  opinion  which  can  at  best  claim 
only  the  amount  of  probability  it  can  derive  from  the  intrinsic  merits  of  the 
arguments  by  which  it  is  itself  supported.1 

Before  passing  from  this  whole  question  we  must  note  the  existence  of  a 
third  school  of  thought,  identified  mainly  with  the  followers  of  Duns  Scotus.2 
These  authors  contend  that  the  distinction  between  essence  and  existence  is 
not  a  real  distinction,  nor  yet,  on  the  other  hand,  is  it  merely  a  virtual  dis- 
tinction, but  one  which  they  call  formalis,  actualis  ex  natura  rei^  that 
between  a  reality  and  its  intrinsic  modes.  It  is  better  known  as  the 
"  Scotistic"  distinction.  We  shall  see  the  nature  of  it  when  dealing  ex  pro- 
fesso  with  the  general  doctrine  of  distinctions. 

The  multiplicity  of  these  views,  and  the  unavoidable  difficulty  experienced 
in  grasping  and  setting  forth  their  meaning  with  any  tolerable  degree  of 
clearness,  would  suggest  the  reflection  that  in  those  controversies  the  medieval 
scholastics  were  perhaps  endeavouring  to  think  and  to  express  what  reality  is, 
apart  from  thought  and  "  independently  of  the  consideration  of  the  mind  " — 
a  task  which,  conceived  in  these  terms,  must  appear  fruitless  ;  and  one  which, 
anyhow,  involves  in  its  very  nature  the  closest  scrutiny  of  the  epistemological 
problem  of  the  power  of  the  human  mind  to  get  at  least  a  true  and  valid,  if 
not  adequate  and  comprehensive,  insight  into  the  nature  of  reality. 

1C/.  URRABURU,  ibid.,  art.  iii.,  Obj.  9,  Resp. 

2  This  view  is  advocated  by,  among  others,  Duns  Scotus  (1266-1308),  Henry  of 
Ghent  (t  1293),  Francis  de  Vittoria  (1480-1566),  Dominicus  de  Soto  (1496-1560), 
Molina  (1535-1600),  Fonseca  (1548-97),  and  Scotists  generally. 


CHAPTER  IV. 
REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD. 

25.  THE  TRANSCENDENTAL  ATTRIBUTES  OR  PROPERTIES  OF 
BEING:  UNITY,  TRUTH,  AND  GOODNESS.— So  far,  we  have 
analysed  the  notions  of  Real  Being,  of  Becoming  or  Change,  of 
Being  as  Possible  and  as  Actual,  of  Essence  and  Existence. 
Before  approaching  a  study  of  the  Categories  or  Suprema  Genera 
Entis,  the  highest  and  widest  modes  in  which  reality  manifests 
itself,  we  have  next  to  consider  certain  attributes  or  properties  of 
being  which  reveal  themselves  as  co-extensive  with  reality  itself. 
Taking  human  experience  in  its  widest  sense,  as  embracing  all 
modes  that  are  cognitive  or  allied  with  consciousness,  as  includ- 
ing intellect,  memory,  imagination,  sense  perception,  will  and 
appetite,  as  speculative,  ethical  or  moral,  and  esthetic  or  artistic, 
— we  find  that  the  reality  which  makes  up  this  complex  human 
experience  of  ours  is  universally  and  necessarily  characterized  by 
certain  features  which  we  call  the  transcendental  attributes  or 
properties  of  being,  inasmuch  as  they  transcend  all  specific  and 
generic  modes  of  being,  pervade  all  its  categories  equally,  and 
are  inseparable  from  any  datum  of  experience.  We  shall  see 
that  they  are  not  really  distinct  from  the  reality  which  they 
characterize,  but  only  logically  distinct  from  it,  being  aspects 
under  which  we  apprehend  it,  negations  or  other  logical  relations 
which  we  necessarily  annex  to  it  by  the  mental  processes  whereby 
we  seek  to  render  it  actually  intelligible  to  our  minds. 

The  first  in  order  of  these  ontological  attributes  is  unity  :  the 
concept  of  that  whereby  reality  considered  in  itself  becomes  a 
definite  object  of  thought.  The  second  in  order  is  truth  :  which 
is  the  conception  of  reality  considered  in  its  relation  to  cogni- 
tive experience,  to  intellect.  The  third  is  goodness :  the  aspect 
under  which  reality  is  related  as  an  object  to  appetitive  experi- 
ence, to  will. 

Now  when  we  predicate  of  any  reality  under  our  considera- 
tion that  it  is  "one,"  or  "good,"  or  "true" — in  the  ontological 

114 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  115 

sense  to  be  explained, — that  which  we  predicate  is  not  a  mere 
ens  rationis,  but  something  real,  something  which  is  really 
identical  with  the  subject,  and  which  is  distinguished  from  the 
latter  in  our  judgment  only  by  a  logical  distinction.  The 
attribution  of  any  of  these  properties  to  the  subject  does  not, 
however,  add  anything  real  to  the  latter :  it  adds  merely  some 
logical  aspect  involved  in,  or  supposed  by,  the  attribution.  At 
the  same  time,  this  logical  aspect  gives  us  real  information  by 
making  explicit  some  real  feature  of  being  not  explicitly  revealed 
in  the  concept  of  being  itself,  although  involved  in,  and  following 
as  a  property  from,  the  latter. 

There  do  not  seem  to  be  any  other  transcendental  properties 
of  being  besides  the  three  enumerated.  The  terms  "reality," 
"  thing,"  "  something,"  are  synonymous  expressions  of  the  con- 
cept of  being  itself,  rather  than  of  properties  of  being.  "  Exis- 
tence "  is  not  a  transcendental  attribute  of  being,  for  it  is  not 
co-extensive  with  reality  or  real  being.  And  although  reality 
must  be  "  either  possible  or  actual,"  "  either  necessary  or  con- 
tingent," "either  infinite  or  finite,"  etc.,  this  necessity  of  verifying 
in  itself  one  or  other  member  of  any  such  alternatives  is  not  a 
property  of  being,  but  rather  something  essentially  rooted  in  the 
very  concept  of  reality  itself.  Some  would  regard  as  a  distinct 
transcendental  attribute  of  being  the  conception  of  the  latter  as 
an  object  of  esthetic  contemplation,  as  manifesting  order  and 
harmony,  as  beautiful.  This  conception  of  being  will  be  found, 
however,  to  flow  from  the  more  fundamental  aspects  of  reality 
considered  as  true  and  as  good,  rather  than  directly  from  the  con- 
cept of  being  itself. 

26.  TRANSCENDENTAL  UNITY.— When  we  think  of  anything 
as  one  we  think  of  it  as  undivided  in  itself.  The  unity  or  one- 
ness of  being  is  the  undividedness  of  being  :  Unum  est  id  quod  est 
indivisum  in  se :  Universaliter  quaecunque  non  habent  divisionem, 
inquantum  non  habent,  sic  unum  dicuntur}  When,  therefore,  we 
conceive  being  as  undivided  into  constitutive  parts,  and  un- 
multiplied  into  repetitions  of  itself,  we  conceive  it  as  a  being,  as 
one.  For  the  concept  of  being,  formally  as  one,  it  does  not 
seem  necessary  that  we  conceive  being  as  divided  or  distinct  from 
all  other  being.  This  second  negation,  of  identity  with  other 
being,  rather  follows  the  conception  of  being  as  one :  being  is 
distinct  from  other  being  because  it  is  already  itself  one :  it  is 

ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.,  lib.  5,  text  ii.,  cap.  6;  ST.  THOMAS,  in  loc.  et  alibi. 

8* 


Ii6  ONTOLOGY 

a  prior  negation  that  formally  constitutes  its  unity,  namely, 
the  negation  of  internal  division  or  multiplication  of  itself :  God 
was  truly  one  from  all  eternity,  before  there  was  any  other  being, 
any  created  being,  distinct  from  Him.  The  division  or  distinc- 
tion of  an  object  of  thought  from  whatever  is  not  itself  is  what 
constitutes  the  notion  of  otherness.1 

It  is  manifest  that  being  and  unity  are  really  identical,  that 
when  we  think  of  being  we  think  of  what  is  really  undivided  in 
itself,  that  once  we  introduce  dividedness  into  the  object  of  our 
concept  we  are  no  longer  thinking  of  being  but  of  beings ',  i.e.  of 
a  multitude  or  plurality  each  member  of  which  is  a  being  and  one. 
For  being,  as  an  object  of  thought,  is  either  simple  or  composite. 
If  simple,  it  is  not  only  undivided  but  indivisible.  If  composite, 
we  cannot  think  of  it  as  a  being,  capable  of  existing,  so  long  as 
we  think  its  parts  as  separate  or  divided :  only  when  we  think  of 
them  as  actually  united  and  undivided  have  we  the  concept  of  a 
being:  and  eo  ipso  we  have  the  concept  of  being  as  one,  as  a 
unity.2 

Hence  the  scholastic  formulae  :  Ens  et  unum  convertuntur, 
and  Omne  ens  est  unum.  The  truth  embodied  in  these  is  so  self- 
evident  that  the  expression  of  it  may  seem  superfluous ;  but  they 
are  not  mere  tautologies,  and  in  the  interests  of  clear  and  con- 
sistent thinking  our  attention  may  be  profitably  directed  to  them. 
The  same  remark  applies  to  much  in  the  present  and  subse- 
quent chapters  on  the  transcendental  attributes  of  being. 

27.  KINDS  OF  UNITY.— (a)  The  unity  we  have  been  de- 
scribing has  been  called  transcendental,  to  distinguish  it  from 
predicamental  unity — the  unity  which  is  proper  to  a  special 
category  of  being,  namely,  quantity,  and  which,  accordingly,  is 
also  called  quantitative  or  mathematical  unity.  While  the  former 
is  common  to  all  being,  with  which  it  is  really  identical,  and  to 
which  it  adds  nothing  real,  the  latter  belongs  and  is  applicable, 
properly  speaking,  only  to  the  mode  of  being  which  is  corporeal, 

144  Si  .  .  .  modus  ends  accipiatur  .  .  .  secundum  divisionem  unius  ab  altero, 
.  .  .  hoc  exprimit  hoc  nomen  aliquid,  dicitur  enim  aliquid  quasi  aliud  quid.  Unde 
sicut  ens  dicitur  unum  inquantum  est  indivisum  in  se,  ita  dicitur  aliquid  inquantum 
est  ab  aliis  diversutn." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veritate,  q.  i,  a.  i. 

2  "  Nam  omne  ens  est  aut  simplex,  aut  compositum.  Quod  autem  est  simplex, 
est  indivisum  et  actu  et  potentia.  Quod  autem  est  compositum,  non  habet  esse, 
quamdiu  partes  ejus  sint  divisae,  sed  postquam  constituunt  et  componunt  ipsum 
compositum.  Unde  manifestum  est  quod  esse  cujuslibet  rei  consistit  in  indivisione  ; 
et  inde  est,  quod  unumquodque  sicut  custodit  suum  esse,  ita  custodit  suam 
unitatem." — ST.  THOMAS,  Sumna  Theol.,  i.,  q.  xi.,  a.  i. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  117 

which  exists  only  as  affected  by  quantity,  as  occupying  space,  as 
capable  of  measurement ;  and  therefore,  also,  this  latter  unity 
adds  something  real  to  the  being  which  it  affects,  namely,  the  at- 
tribute of  quantity,  of  which  unity  is  the  measure  and  the  generat- 
ing principle.1  For  quantity,  as  we  shall  see,  is  a  mode  of  being 
really  distinct  from  the  corporeal  substance  which  it  affects.  The 
quantity  has  its  own  transcendental  unity ;  so  has  the  substance 
which  it  quantifies ;  so  has  the  composite  whole,  the  quantified 
body,  but  this  latter  transcendental  unity,  like  the  composite 
being  with  which  it  is  identical,  is  not  a  unum  per  se  but  only  a 
unum  per  accidens  (cf.  b,  infra). 

We  derive  our  notion  of  quantitative  or  mathematical  unity, 
which  is  the  principle  of  counting  and  the  standard  of  measuring, 
from  dividing  mentally  the  continuous  quantity  or<  magnitude 
which  is  one  of  the  immediate  data  of  sense  experience.  Now 
the  distinction  between  this  unit  and  transcendental  unity 
supposes  not  merely  that  quantity  is  really  distinct  from  the 
corporeal  substance,  but  also  that  the  human  mind  is  capable  of 
conceiving  as  real  certain  modes  of  being  other  than  the  cor- 
poreal, modes  to  which  quantitative  concepts  and  processes, 
such  as  counting  and  measuring,  are  not  properly  applicable,  as 
they  are  to  corporeal  reality,  but  only  in  an  analogical  or  trans- 
ferred sense  (2).  The  notion  of  transcendental  unity,  therefore, 
bears  the  same  relation  to  that  of  quantitative  unity,  as  the  notion 
of  being  in  general  bears  to  that  of  quantified  or  corporeal  being. 

(#)  Transcendental  unity  may  be  either  essential  (or  sub- 
stantial, "unum  per  se"  "unum  simpliciter"\  or  accidental 
("  unum  per  accidens"  "  unum  secundum  quid"}.  The  former 
characterizes  a  being  which  has  nothing  in  it  beyond  what  is 
essential  to  it  as  such,  e.g.  the  unity  of  any  substance :  and  this 
unity  is  twofold — (i)  unity  of  simplicity  and  (2)  unity  of  composi- 
tion— according  as  the  substance  is  essentially  simple  (such  as  the 
human  soul  or  a  pure  spirit)  or  essentially  composite  (such  as  man, 
or  any  corporeal  substance :  since  every  such  substance  is  com- 
posed essentially  of  a  formative  and  an  indeterminate  principle).2 

1 "  Unum  vero  quod  est  principium  numeri,  addit  supra  substantiam  rationem 
mensurae,  quae  est  propria  passio  quantitatis,  et  primo  invenitur  in  unitate.  Et 
dicitur  per  privationem  vel  negationem  divisionis,  quae  est  secundum  quantitatem 
continuam.  Nam  numerus  ex  divisione  continui  causatur." — ST.  THOMAS,  In 
Metaph.,  lib.  4,  lect.  2,  par.  b. 

2  Those  who  regard  the  distinction  between  the  essence  and  the  existence  of 
an  actually  existing  substance  as  real  consider  the  latter  as  an  ens  unum  per  se, 


n8  ONTOLOGY 

Accidental  unity  is  the  unity  of  a  being  whose  constituent 
factors  or  contents  are  not  really  united  in  such  a  way  as  to  form 
one  essence,  whether  simple  or  composite.  It  is  threefold : 
(l)  collective  unity,  or  unity  of  aggregation,  as  of  a  heap  of  stones 
or  a  crowd  of  men  ;  (2)  artificial  unity,  as  of  a  house  or  a  picture  ; 
and  (3)  natural  or  physical  unity,  as  of  any  existing  substance 
with  its  connatural  accidents,  e.g.  a  living  organism  with  its  size, 
shape,  qualities,  etc.,  or  the  human  soul  with  its  faculties.1 

(>)  Transcendental  unity  may  be  either  individual  (singular, 
numerical,  concrete,  real)  or  universal  (specific,  generic,  abstract, 
logical).  The  former  is  that  which  characterizes  being  or  reality 
considered  as  actually  existing  or  as  proximately  capable  of 
existing :  the  unity  of  an  individual  nature  or  essence  :  the  unity 
whereby  a  being  is  not  merely  undivided  in  itself  but  incapable 
of  repetition  or  multiplication  of  itself.  It  is  only  the  individual 
as  such  that  can  actually  exist :  the  abstract  and  universal  is 
incapable  of  actually  existing  as  such.  We  shall  examine  pre- 
sently what  it  is  that  individuates  reality,  and  what  it  is  that 
renders  it  capable  of  existing  actually  in  the  form  of  "  things  "  or 
of  "  persons  " — the  forms  in  which  it  actually  presents  itself  in 
our  experience. 

Abstract  or  universal  unity  is  the  unity  which  characterizes 
a  reality  conceived  as  an  abstract,  universal  object  by  the  human 
intellect.  The  object  of  a  specific  or  generic  concept,  "  man  "  or 
"animal,"  for  example,  is  one  in  this  sense,  undivided  in  itself, 
but  capable  of  indefinite  multiplication  or  repetition  in  the  only 
mode  in  which  it  can  actually  exist — the  individual  mode.  The 
universal  is  unum  aptum  inesse pluribus. 

Finally,  we  can  conceive  any  nature  or  essence  without  con- 
sidering it  in  either  of  its  alternative  states — either  as  individual 
or  as  universal.  Thus  conceived  it  is  characterized  by  a  unity 
which  has  been  commonly  designated  as  abstract,  or  (by  Scot- 
ists)  as  formal  unity. 

28.  MULTITUDE  AND  NUMBER. — The  one  has  for  its  corre- 

The  existence  of  a  real  distinction  between  the  essential  constitutive  factors  of  a 
composite  substance  is  universally  regarded  by  scholastics  as  compatible  with 
essential  unity — unitas  per  se — in  the  latter.  Such  factors  are  really  distinct,  and 
separable  or  divisible,  but  actually  undivided.  So  also,  the  union  of  an  individual 
nature  and  its  subsistence  (73)  forms  a  unum  per  se  (unum  compositionis)  in  the  view 
of  those  who  place  a  real  distinction  between  these  factors. 

1  Of  course  essential  unity  of  composition  is  also  "  natural  ".  C/.  KLEUTGEN, 
op.  cit.,  §§  631-8. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD 


119 


lative  the  manifold.  Units,  one  of  which  is  not  the  other,  con- 
stitute multitude  or  plurality.  If  unity  is  the  negation  of  actual 
division  in  being,  multitude  results  from  a  second  negation,  that, 
namely,  by  which  the  undivided  being  or  unit  is  marked  off  or 
divided  from  other  units.1  We  have  defined  unity  by  the  negation 
of  actual  intrinsic  dividedness ;  and  we  have  seen  it  to  be  com- 
patible with  extrinsic  dividedness,  or  otherness.  Thus  the  vague 
notion  of  dividedness  is  anterior  to  that  of  unity.  Now  multitude 
involves  dividedness  ;  but  it  also  involves  and  presupposes  the 
intrinsic  undividedness  or  unity  of  each  constituent  of  the  mani- 
fold. In  the  real  order  of  things  the  one  is  prior  to  all  divided- 
ness  ;  but  on  account  of  the  sensuous  origin  of  our  concepts  we 
can  define  the  former  only  by  exclusion  of  the  latter.  The 
order  in  which  we  obtain  these  ideas  seems,  therefore,  to  be  as 
follows  :  "  first  being,  then  dividedness,  next  unity  which  excludes 
dividedness,  and  finally  multitude  which  consists  of  units  ".2 

The  relation  of  the  one  to  the  manifold  is  that  of  undivided 
being  to  divided  being.  The  same  reality  cannot  be  one  and 
manifold  under  the  same  aspect ;  though  obviously  a  being  may 
be  actually  one  and  potentially  manifold  or  vice  versa,  or  one 
under  a  certain  aspect  and  manifold  under  another  aspect. 

From  the  transcendental  plurality  or  multitude  which  we 
have  just  described  we  can  distinguish  predicamental  or  quanti- 
tative plurality :  a  distinction  which  is  to  be  understood  in  the 
same  way  as  when  applied  to  unity.  Quantitative  multitude  is 
the  actually  separated  or  divided  condition  of  quantified  being. 
Number  is  a  multitude  measured  or  counted  by  unity :  it  is  a 
counted,  and,  therefore,  necessarily  a  definite  and  finite  multitude. 
Now  it  is  mathematical  unity  that  is,  properly,  the  principle  of 
number  and  the  standard  or  measure  of  all  counting  ;  and  there- 
fore it  is  only  to  realities  which  fall  within  the  category  of 
quantity — in  other  words,  to  material  being — that  the  concept 
of  number  is  properly  applicable.  No  doubt  we  can  and  do 

1 "  Unum  quod  convertitur  cum  ente  ponit  quidem  ipsum  ens,  sed  nihil  super- 
addit,  nisi  negationem  divisionis.  Multitude  autem  ei  correspondens  addit  supra 
res,  quae  dicuntur  multas,  quod  unaquagque  earum  sit  una,  et  quod  una'earum  non 
sit  altera.  .  .  .  Et  sic,  cum  unum  addat  supra  ens  unam  negationem,  secundum 
quod  aliquid  est  indivisum  in  se,  multitude  addit  duas  negationes,  prout  scilicet 
aliquid  est  in  se  indivisum,  et  prout  est  ab  alio  divisum,  et  unum  eorum  non  esse 
alterum." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Potent.,  q.  9,  a.  7. 

2u  Sic  ergo  primo  in  intellectu  nostro  cadit  ens,  et  deinde  divisio,  etpost  hoc 
unum  quod  divisionem  privat,  et  ultimo  multitude  quae  ex  unitatibus  constituitur." — 
ST.  THOMAS,  In  Metaph.,  lib.  10,  lect.  4,  par.  c. 


120  ONTOLOGY 

conceive  transcendental  unity  after  the  analogy  of  the  quantita- 
tive unity  which  is  the  principle  of  counting  and  measuring  ;  and 
no  doubt  we  can  use  the  transcendental  concept  of  "  actually 
undivided  being  "  as  a  principle  of  enumeration,  and  so  "  count " 
or  "  enumerate "  spiritual  beings ;  but  this  counting  is  only 
analogical ;  and  many  philosophers,  following  Aristotle  and  St. 
Thomas,  hold  that  the  concepts  of  numerical  multiplicity  and 
numerical  distinction  are  not  properly  applicable  to  immaterial 
beings,  that  these  latter  differ  individually  from  one  another  not 
numerically ',  but  each  by  its  whole  nature  .or  essence,  that  is, 
formally^ 

29.  THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  THE  UNIVERSAL. — We  have  dis- 
tinguished transcendental  unity  into  individual  and  universal 
(27,  c\  Reality  as  endowed  with  universal  unity  is  reality  as 
apprehended  by  abstract  thought  to  be  capable  of  indefinite 
repetition  or  multiplication  of  itself  in  actual  existence.  Reality 
as  endowed  with  individual  unity  is  reality  apprehended  as 
actually  existing,  or  as  proximately  capable  of  actually  existing, 
and  as  therefore  incapable  of  any  repetition  or  multiplication  of 
itself,  of  any  division  of  itself  into  other  "  selves"  or  communica- 
tion of  itself  to  other  "  selves  ".  While,  therefore,  the  universal 
has  its  reality  only  in  the  individuals  to  which  it  communicates 
itself,  and  which  thus  embody  it,  the  individual  has  its  reality  in 
itself  and  of  its  own  right,  so  to  speak  :  when  it  actually  exists 
it  is  "sui  juris"  and  as  such  incommunicable,  "  incommuni- 
cabilis".  The  actually  existing  individual  is  called  in  Latin  a 
" suppositum" — a  term  which  we  shall  render  by  the  English 
"  thing  "  or  "  individual  thing  ".  It  was  called  by  Aristotle  the 
ovcrla  Trp&Trj,  substantia  prima)  "  first  substance,"  or  "  first 
essence,"  to  distinguish  it  from  the  substance  or  essence  con- 
ceived by  abstract  thought  as  universal  ;  the  latter  being  desig- 
nated as  ova-La  Sevrepa,  substantia  secunday  "  second  substance  " 
or  "  second  essence  ". 

Now  it  is  a  fundamental  assumption  in  Aristotelian  and 
scholastic  philosophy  that  whatever  actually  exists,  or  whatever 

1  Omnis  pluralitas  consequitur  aliquam  divisionem.  Est  autem  duplex  divisio  : 
una  materialis  quae  fit  secundum  divisionem  continui,  et  hanc  sequitur  numerus, 
qui  est  species  quantitatis.  Unde  talis  numerus,  non  est  nisi  in  rebus  materialibus 
habentibus  quantitatem.  Alia  est  divisio  formalis,  quae  fit  per  oppositas  vel 
diversas  formas :  et  hanc  divisionem  sequitur  multitude  quas  non  est  in  aliquo 
genere,  sed  est  de  transcendentibus,  secundum  quod  ens  dividitur  per  unum  et 
multa.  Et  talem  multitudinem  solam  contingit  esse  in  rebus  immaterialibus. — 
ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  xxx.,  art.  3. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  121 

is  real  in  the  sense  that  as  such  it  is  proximately  capable  of 
actual  existence,  is  and  must  be  individual  :  that  the  universal  as 
such  is  not  real,  i.e.  as  such  cannot  actually  exist.  And  the 
manifest  reason  for  this  assumption  is  that  whatever  actually 
exists  must  be,  with  entire  definiteness  and  determinateness,  its 
own  self  and  nothing  else  :  it  cannot  be  capable  of  division  or 
repetition  of  itself,  of  that  which  it  really  is,  into  "  other " 
realities  which  would  still  be  "  that  individual  thing ".  But 
reality  considered  as  universal  is  capable  of  such  repetition  of 
itself  indefinitely.  Therefore  reality  cannot  actually  exist  as  uni- 
versal, but  only  as  individual. 

This  is  merely  plain  common  sense  ;  nor  does  the  idealistic  monism 
which  appears  to  attribute  reality  to  the  universal  as  such,  and  which  inter- 
prets reality  exclusively  according  to  the  forms  in  which  it  presents  itself  to 
abstract  thought,  really  run  counter  to  this  consideration  ;  for  what  it  really 
holds  is  not  that  universals  as  such  are  real,  but  that  they  are  phases  of  the 
all-one  reality  which  is  itself  one  individual  being. 

But  many  modern  philosophers  hold  that  individuality,  no  less  than 
universality,  is  a  form  of  thought.  No  doubt  "  individuality  "  in  the  abstract 
is,  no  less  than  universality,  an  object  abstracted  from  the  data  of  experience 
by  the  mind's  analysis  of  the  latter.  But  this  is  not  what  those  philosophers 
mean.  They  mean  that  the  individual  as  such  is  not  a  real  datum  of  experi- 
ence. From  the  Kantian  view  that  individuality  is  a  purely  mental  form 
with  which  the  mind  invests  the  datum,  they  draw  the  subjectivist  conclusion 
that  the  world,  thus  interpreted  as  consisting  of  "  individuals,"  is  a  pheno- 
menal or  mental  product  for  the  objective  validity  of  which  there  can  be  to 
man's  speculative  reason  no  sufficient  guarantee. 

To  this  theory  we  oppose  that  of  Aristotle  and  the  scholastics,  not  merely 
that  the  individual  alone  is  actually  existent,  but  that  as  actually  existent  and 
as  individual  it  is  actually  given  to  us  and  apprehended  by  us  in  internal  and 
external  sense  experience  ;  and  that  although  in  the  inorganic  world,  and  to 
some  extent  in  the  lower  forms  of  life,  we  may  not  be  able  to  determine  for 
certain  what  portions  of  this  experience  are  distinct  individuals,  still  in  the 
world  of  living  things  generally,  and  especially  of  the  animal  kingdom,  there 
can  be  no  difficulty  in  determining  this,  for  the  simple  reason  that  here  reality 
is  given  to  us  in  sense  experience  as  consisting  of  distinct  individuals. 

At  the  same  time  it  is  true  that  we  can  understand  these 
individual  realities,  interpret  them,  read  the  meaning  of  them, 
only  by  the  intellectual  function  of  judgment,  i.e.  by  the  analytic 
and  synthetic  activity  whereby  we  abstract  and  universalize 
certain  aspects  of  them,  and  use  these  aspects  as  predicates  of 
the  individuals.  Now,  seeing  that  intellectual  thought,  as  dis- 
tinct from  sense  experience,  apprehends  its  objects  only  as 
abstract  and  potentially  universal,  only  as  static,  self-identical, 


122  ONTOLOGY 

possible  essences,  and  nevertheless  predicates  these  of  the  con- 
crete, individual,  contingent,  actually  existing  "things"  of  sense 
experience,  identifying  them  with  the  latter  in  affirmative  judg- 
ments ;  seeing  moreover,  that — since  the  intellectual  knowledge 
we  thus  acquire  about  the  data  of  sense  experience  is  genuine 
and  not  chimerical — those  "  objects"  of  abstract  thought  must  be 
likewise  real,  and  must  be  really  in  those  individual  sense  data 
(according  to  the  theory  of  knowledge  which  finds  its  expression 
in  Moderate  Realism), — there  arises  immediately  the  problem,  or 
rather  the  group  of  problems,  regarding  the  relations  between 
reality  as  revealed  to  intellect,  i.e.  as  abstract  and  universal,  and 
reality  as  revealed  to  sense,  i.e.  as  concrete  and  individual.  In 
other  words,  we  have  to  inquire  how  we  are  to  interpret  in- 
tellectually the  fact  that  reality,  which  as  a  possible  essence  is 
universal  for  abstract  thought,  is  nevertheless,  as  actually  exist- 
ing, individualized  for  sense — and  consequently  for  intellect  re- 
flecting on  the  data  of  sense.1 

30.  THE  "  METAPHYSICAL  GRADES  OF  BEING  "  IN  THE  IN- 
DIVIDUAL.—What,  then  is  the  relation  between  all  that  intellect 
can  apprehend  in  the  individual,  viz.  its  lowest  class  essence  or 
specific  nature,  and  its  whole  nature  as  an  individual,  its  essentia 
atoma  or  individual  nature  ?  We  can  best  approach  this  problem 
by  considering  first  these  various  abstract  thought- objects  which 
intellect  can  apprehend  in  the  individual. 

What  are  called  the  metaphysical  grades  of  being,  those 
positive  moments  of  perfection  or  reality  which  the  mind  detects 
in  the  individual,  as,  for  instance,  substantiality,  materiality, 
organic  life,  animality,  rationality,  individuality,  in  the  individual 
man — whether  we  describe  them  as  "  phases  "  or  "  aspects  "  or 
"  formalities  "  of  being — are  undoubtedly  distinct  objects  for  ab- 
stract thought.  Why  does  it  thus  distinguish  between  them,  and 
express  them  by  distinct  concepts,  even  when  it  finds  them 

1  We  may  confine  our  attention  here  to  substances,  assuming  for  the  present 
that  accidents  are  individuated  by  the  individual  substances  in  which  they  inhere. 
We  may  note  further  that  it  is  only  corporeal  individuals  that  fall  directly  within  our 
experience.  We  can,  of  course,  infer  from  the  latter  the  actual  existence  of  indi- 
vidual spiritual  realities  subsisting  apart  from  matter,  viz.  human  souls  after  death, 
and  also  the  possibility  of  purely  spiritual  individual  beings  such  as  angels.  But 
when  we  conceive  these  as  individuals  we  must  conceive  them  after  the  analogy  of 
individuals  in  the  domain  of  corporeal  reality  :  it  is  only  through  concepts  derived 
from  this  domain,  and  finding  their  proper  application  within  it,  that  we  can  have 
any  knowledge  of  suprasensible  or  spiritual  realities,  viz.  by  applying  those  concepts 
analogically  to  the  latter. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  123 

embodied  in  a  single  individual?  Because,  reflecting  on  the 
manner  in  which  reality  presents  itself,  through  sense  experience, 
as  actually  existing,  it  finds  resemblances  and  differences  between 
individually  distinct  data.  It  finds  in  some  of  them  grades  of 
reality  which  it  does  not  find  in  others,  individual,  specific,  and 
generic  grades  ;  and  some — transcendental — grades  common  to 
all.  Now  between  these  various  grades  of  being  as  found  in  one 
and  the  same  individual  it  cannot  be  denied  that  there  exists  a 
logical  distinction  with  a  foundation  or  ground  for  it  in  the  in- 
dividual reality  ;  because  the  latter,  being  more  or  less  similar  to 
other  individual  realities,  causes  the  mind  to  apprehend  it  by  a 
number  of  distinct  concepts :  the  individuality  whereby  it  differs 
really  from  all  other  individuals  of  the  same  species ;  the  specific, 
differential  and  generic  grades  of  being  whereby  it  is  conceptually 
identified  with  wider  and  wider  classes  of  things  ;  and  the  trans- 
cendental grades  whereby  it  is  conceptually  identified  with  all 
others.  The  similarity  of  really  distinct  individuals,  which  is  the 
conceptual  identity  of  their  qualities,  is  the  ground  on  which  we 
conceptually  identify  their  essences.  Now  is  there  any  reason 
for  thinking  that  these  grounds  of  similarity,  as  found  in  the  in- 
dividual, are  really  distinct  from  one  another  in  the  latter  ?  They 
are  certainly  conceptually  distinct  expressions — each  less  in- 
adequate than  the  wider  ones — of  what  is  really  one  individual 
essence.  But  we  must  take  them  to  be  all  really  identical  in  and 
with  this  individual  essence,  unless  we  are  prepared  to  hold  con- 
ceptual plurality  as  such  to  be  real  plurality ;  in  which  case  we 
should  also  hold  conceptual  unity  as  such  to  be  real  unity.  But 
this  latter  view  is  precisely  the  error  of  extreme  realism,  of  reify- 
ing abstract  concepts  and  holding  the  "  universale  a  parte  rei  "  .-  a 
theory  which  leads  logically  to  monism.1 

31.  INDIVIDUALITY. — The  distinction,  therefore,  between 
these  grades  of  being  in  the  individual,  is  a  virtual  distinction,  i.e. 
a  logical  distinction  with  a  ground  for  it  in  the  reality.  This  is 
the  sort  of  distinction  which  exists  between  the  specific  nature  of 
the  individual,  i.e.  what  is  contained  in  the  definition  of  the  lowest 
class  to  which  it  belongs,  and  its  individuality,  i.e.  what  consti- 
tutes its  nature  or  essence  as  an  individual.  No  doubt  the 
concrete  existing  individual  contains,  besides  its  individual  nature 
or  essence,  a  variety  of  accidental  characteristics  which  serve  as 

!The  "formal-actual"  distinction,  which  Scotists  advocate  between  these 
grades  of  being,  we  shall  examine  later. 


124  ONTOLOGY 

marks  or  signs  whereby  its  individuality  is  revealed  to  us.  These 
are  called  "  individualizing  characteristics,"  "  notae  individu- 
antes"  the  familiar  scholastic  list  of  them  being  " forma,  figura, 
locuS)  tempuS)  stirps, patria^  nomen"  with  manifest  reference  to 
the  individual  "man".  But  though  these  characteristics  enable 
us  to  mark  off  the  individual  in  space  and  time  from  other  in- 
dividuals of  the  same  class,  thus  revealing  individuality  to  us  in 
the  concrete,  it  cannot  be  held  that  they  constitute  the  in- 
dividuality of  the  nature  or  substance  in  each  case.  If  the  human 
substance,  essence,  or  nature,  as  found  in  Socrates,  were  held  to 
differ  from  the  human  substance,  essence,  or  nature,  as  found  in 
Plato,  only  by  the  fact  that  in  each  it  is  affected  by  a  different 
set  of  accidents,  i.e.  of  modes  accidental  to  the  substance  as  found 
in  each,  then  it  would  follow  that  this  substance  is  not  merely 
conceptually  identical  in  both,  but  that  it  is  really  identical  in 
both;  which  is  the  error  of  extreme  realism.  As  a  matter  of 
fact  it  is  the  converse  that  is  true :  the  sets  of  accidents  are 
distinct  because  they  affect  individual  substances  already  really 
and  individually  distinct. 

It  is  manifest  that  the  accidents  which  are  separable  from  the 
individual  substance,  e.g.  name,  shape,  size,  appearance,  location, 
etc.,  cannot  constitute  its  individuality.  There  are,  however, 
other  characteristics  which  are  inseparable  from  the  individual 
substance,  or  which  are  properties  of  the  latter,  e.g.  the  fact  that  an 
individual  man  was  born  of  certain  parents.  Perhaps  it  is  such 
characteristics  that  give  its  individuality  to  the  individual  sub- 
stance ? *  To  think  so  would  be  to  misunderstand  the  question 
under  discussion.  We  are  not  now  inquiring  into  the  extrinsic 
causes  whereby  actually  existing  reality  is  individuated,  into  the 
efficient  principles  of  its  individuation,  but  into  the  formal  and 
intrinsic  principle  of  the  latter.  There  must  obviously  be  some- 
thing intrinsic  to  the  individual  reality  itself  whereby  it  is  individu- 
ated. And  it  is  about  this  intrinsic  something  we  are  inquiring. 
The  individual  man  is  this  individual,  human  nature  is  thus 
individuated  in  him,  by  something  that  is  essential  to  human 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  p.  280:  "  Principium  .  .  .  intrinsicum  vel  formale 
est  aliquid  insitum  rei,  pertinensque  ad  intrinsecam  et  ultimam  individui  constitu- 
tionem,  et  fundans  formalitatem  illam,  quae  individuatio  dicitur.  Sicut  enim 
materia  est  in  homine,  v.g.  principium  et  fundamentum  propter  quod  est,  ac  praedi- 
catur  materialis^  et  forma  fundat  in  eodem  praedicatum  ratlonalis,  totaque  natura 
composita,  humanitas,  praedicatum  hominis ;  ita  quaerimus  quid  sit  illud  primum 
principium,  unde  existit  in  quovis  individuo  sua  peculiaris  ac  propria  individuatio," 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  125 

nature  as  found  in  him.  This  something  has  been  called — after 
the  analogy  of  the  differentia  specified  which  differentiates  species 
within  a  genus — the  differentia  individua  of  the  individual.  It 
has  also  been  called  by  some  the  differentia  numerica,  and  by 
Scotists  the  haecceitas.  However  we  are  to  conceive  this  some- 
thing, it  is  certain  at  all  events  that,  considered  as  it  is  really 
found  in  the  individual,  it  cannot  be  anything  really  distinct  from 
the  specific  nature  of  the  latter.  No  doubt,  the  differentia 
specifica,  considered  in  the  abstract,  it  is  not  essential  and  intrinsic 
to  the  natura  generica  considered  in  the  abstract :  it  is  extrinsic 
and  accidental  to  the  abstract  content  of  the  latter  notion  ;  but 
this  is  because  we  are  conceiving  these  grades  of  being  in  the 
abstract.  The  same  is  true  of  the  differentia  individua  as  com- 
pared with  the  natura  speciftca  in  the  abstract.  But  we  are 
now  considering  these  grades  of  reality  as  they  are  actually  in 
the  concrete  individual  being :  and  as  they  are  found  here,  we 
have  seen  that  a  real  distinction  between  them  is  inadmissible. 

32.  THE  "  PRINCIPLE  OF  INDIVIDUATION  ". — How,  then,  are 
we  to  conceive  this  something  which  individuates  reality?  It 
may  be  well  to  point  out  that  for  the  erroneous  doctrine  of 
extreme  realism,  which  issues  in  monism,  the  problem  of  individua- 
tion,  as  here  understood,  does  not  arise.  For  the  monist  all  plurality 
in  being  is  merely  apparent,  not  real  :  there  can  be  no  question 
of  a  real  distinction  between  individual  and  individual.1  Simi- 
larly, the  nominalist  and  the  conceptualist  evade  the  problem. 
For  these  the  individual  alone  is  not  merely  formally  real :  it 
alone  is  fundamentally  real  :  the  universal  is  not  even  funda- 
mentally real,  has  no  foundation  in  reality,  and  thus  all  scientific 
knowledge  of  reality  as  revealed  in  sense  experience  is  rendered 

1  In  ancient  Greece  the  Eleatics  argued  against  the  possibility  of  real  plurality 
somewhat  in  this  wise  :  If  there  were  really  different  beings  any  two  of  them  would 
differ  from  each  other  only  by  some  third  reality,  and  this  again  from  each  of  the 
former  by  a  fourth  and  a  fifth  reality,  and  so  on  ad  infinitum  :  which  would  involve 
the  absurdities  of  infinite-  number  and  infinite  regress.  A  similar  argument  was 
used  by  the  medieval  pantheist,  David  of  Dinant,  to  identify  God  with  the  material 
principle  of  corporeal  reality :  God  and  primary  matter  exist  and  do  not  differ ; 
therefore  they  are  identical :  for  if  they  differed  they  should  differ  by  something 
distinct  from  either,  and  this  again  should  differ  from  both  by  something  distinct 
from  all  three,  and  so  on  ad  infinitum  :  which  is  absurd.  Such  sophisms  arise  from 
accepting  the  purely  abstract  view  of  reality  as  adequate.  We  have  seen  already, 
in  dealing  with  the  abstract  notion  of  being,  that  from  this  point  of  view  it  must  be 
recognized  and  admitted  that  the  reality  whereby  things  differ  (viz.  being)  is  also 
the  reality  wherein  they  agree  (viz.  being,  also).  The  paradox  is  restated  below  in 
regard  to  individuation. 


126  ONTOLOGY 

impossible.  But  for  the  moderate  realist,  while  the  individual 
alone  is  formally  real,  the  universal  is  fundamentally  real,  and 
hence  the  problem  arises.  It  may  be  forcibly  stated  in  the  form 
of  a  paradox :  That  whereby  Socrates  and  Plato  are  really  dis- 
tinct from  each  other  as  individuals  is  really  identical  with  the 
human  nature  which  is  really  in  both.  But  what  individuates 
human  nature  in  Socrates,  or  in  Plato,  is  logically  distinct  from 
the  human  nature  that  is  really  in  Socrates,  and  really  in  Plato. 
We  have  only  to  inquire,  therefore,  whether  the  intrinsic  principle 
of  individuation  is  to  be  conceived  merely  as  a  negation,  as  some- 
thing negative  added  by  the  mind  to  the  concept  of  the  specific 
nature,  whereby  the  latter  is  apprehended  as  incapable  of  multi- 
plication into  "  others  "  each  of  which  would  be  formally  that  same 
nature,  or,  in  other  words,  as  incommunicable  ;  or  is  the  intrinsic 
ground  of  this  incommunicability  to  be  conceived  as  something 
positive,  not  indeed  as  something  really  distinct  from,  and  super- 
added  to,  the  specific  nature,  but  as  a  positive  aspect  of  the  latter, 
an  aspect,  moreover,  not  involved  in  the  concept  of  the  specific 
nature  considered  in  the  abstract. 

Of  the  many  views  that  have  been  put  forward  on  this 
question  two  or  three  call  for  some  attention.  In  the  opinion  of 
Thomists  generally,  the  principle  which  individuates  material 
things,  thus  multiplying  numerically  the  same  specific  nature,  is 
to  be  conceived  as  a  positive  mode  affecting  the  latter  and  reveal- 
ing it  in  a  new  aspect,  whereas  the  specific  nature  of  the  spiritual 
individual  is  itself  formally  an  individual.  The  principle  of  the 
latter's  individuation  is  already  involved  in  the  very  concept  of  its 
specific  nature,  and  therefore  is  not  to  be  conceived  as  a  distinct 
positive  aspect  of  the  latter  but  simply  as  the  absence  of  plurality 
and  communicability  in  the  latter.  In  material  things,  moreover, 
the  positive  mode  or  aspect  whereby  the  specific  nature  is  found 
numerically  multiplied,  and  incommunicable  as  it  exists  in  each, 
consists  in  the  fact  that  such  a  specific  nature  involves  in  its  very 
constitution  a  material  principle  which  is  actually  allied  with 
certain  quantitative  dimensions.  Hence  the  principle  which 
individuates  material  substances  is  not  to  be  conceived — after  the 
manner  in  which  Scotists  conceive  it — as  an  ultimate  differentia 
affecting  the  formal  factor  of  the  nature,  determining  the  specific 
nature  just  as  the  differentia  specifica  determines  the  generic  nature, 
but  as  a  material  differentiating  principle.  What  individuates 
the  material  individual,  what  marks  it  off  as  one  in  itself,  distinct 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  127 

or  divided  from  other  individuals  of  the  same  specific  nature,  and 
incommunicable  in  that  condition,  is  the  material  factor  of  that 
individual's  nature — not,  indeed,  the  material  factor,  materia 
prima,  considered  in  the  abstract,  but  the  material  factor  as 
proximately  capable  of  actual  existence  by  being  allied  to  certain 
more  or  less  definite  spatial  or  quantitative  dimensions  :  "  matter 
affected  with  quantity  "  :  "  materia  quantitate  signata  ".l 

In  regard  to  material  substances  this  doctrine  embraces  two 
separate  contentions  :  (a)  that  the  principle  which  individuates 
such  a  substance  must  be  conceived  as  something  positive,  not 
really  distinct  from,  but  yet  not  contained  in,  the  specific  nature 
considered  in  the  abstract ;  (b)  that  this  positive  aspect  is  to  be 
found  not  in  the  formal  but  in  the  material  principle  of  the  com- 
posite corporeal  substance. 

To  the  former  contention  it  might  be  objected  that  what 
individuates  the  specific  nature  cannot  be  conceived  as  anything 
positive,  superadded  to  this  nature :  it  cannot  be  anything  acci- 
dental to  the  latter,  for  if  it  were,  the  individual  would  be  only  an 
accidental  unity,  a  "  unum  per  accidens"  and  would  be  constituted 
by  an  accident,  which  we  have  seen  to  be  inadmissible ;  nor,  on 
the  other  hand,  can  it  be  anything  essential  to  the  specific  nature, 
for  if  it  were,  then  individuals  should  be  capable  of  adequate 
essential  definition,  and  furthermore  the  definition  of  the  specific 
nature  would  not  really  give  the  whole  essence  or  quidditas  of 
the  individuals — two  consequences  which  are  commonly  rejected 
by  all  scholastics.  To  this,  however,  it  is  replied  that  the 
principle  of  individuation  is  something  essential  to  the  specific 
nature  in  the  sense  that  it  is  something  intrinsic  to,  and  really 
identical  with,  the  whole  real  substance  or  entity  of  this  nature, 
though  not  involved  in  the  abstract  concept  by  the  analysis  of 
which  we  reach  the  definition  or  quidditas  of  this  nature.  What 
individuates  Socrates  is  certainly  essential  to  Socrates,  and  is 
therefore  really  identical  with  his  human  nature ;  it  is  intrinsic  to 
the  human  nature  in  him,  a  mode  or  aspect  of  his  human  sub- 
stance ;  yet  it  does  not  enter  into  the  definition  of  his  nature — 
"  animal  rationale" — for  such  definition  abstracts  from  individual- 
ity. When,  therefore,  we  say  that  definition  of  the  specific  nature 

1  Materia  .  .  .  dupliciter  accipitur,  scilicet,  ut  signata  et  non  signata.  Et 
dicitur  signata,  secundum  quod  consideratur  cum  determinatione  dimensionum 
harum  scilicet  vel  illarum  ;  non  signata  autem,  quae  sine  determinatione  dimensionum 
consideratur.  Secundum  hoc  igitui  est  sciendum,  quod  materia  signata  est  in- 
dividuationis  principium. — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veritate,  q.  ii.,  art.  6,  ad.  yum. 


128  ONTOLOGY 

gives  the  whole  essence  of  an  individual,  we  mean  that  it  gives 
explicitly  the  abstract  (specific)  essence,  not  the  individuality 
which  is  really  identical  with  this,  nor,  therefore,  the  whole  sub- 
stantial reality  of  the  individual.  We  give  different  answers  to 
the  questions,  "  What  is  Socrates?"  and  "Who  is  Socrates?". 
The  answer  to  the  former  question — a  "  man,"  or  a  "  rational 
animal" — gives  the  " essence,"  but  not  explicitly  the  whole 
substantial  reality  of  the  individual,  this  remaining  incapable  of 
adequate  conceptual  analysis.  The  latter  question  we  answer  by 
giving  the  notes  that  reveal  individuality.  These,  of  course,  are 
"accidental  "  in  the  strict  sense.  But  even  the  principles  which 
constitute  the  individuality  of  separate  individuals  of  the  same 
species,  and  which  differentiate  these  individuals  numerically  from 
one  another,  we  do  not  describe  as  essential  differences,  whereas 
we  do  describe  specific  and  generic  differences  as  essential.  The 
reason  of  this  is  that  the  latter  are  abstract,  universal,  conceptual, 
amenable  to  intellectual  analysis,  scientifically  important,  while 
the  former  are  just  the  reverse ;  the  universal  differences  alone 
are  principles  about  which  we  can  have  scientific  knowledge, 
for  "all  science  is  of  the  abstract  and  universal"  j1  and  this  is 
what  we  have  in  mind  when  we  describe  them  as  "  essential " 
or  "  formal,"  and  individual  differences  as  "  entitative "  or 
"  material ". 

The  second  point  in  the  Thomistic  doctrine  is  that  corporeal 
substances  are  individuated  by  reason  of  their  materiality.  The 
formative,  specific,  determining  principle  of  the  corporeal  sub- 
stance is  rendered  incommunicable  by  its  union  with  the  material, 
determinable  principle ;  and  it  becomes  individually  distinct  or 
separate  by  the  fact  that  this  latter  principle,  in  order  to  be  cap- 
able of  union  with  the  given  specific  form,  has  in  its  very  essence 
an  exigence  for  certain  more  or  less  determinate  dimensions  in 
space.  Corporeal  things  have  their  natural  size  within  certain 
limits.  The  individual  of  a  given  corporeal  species  can  exist  only 
because  the  material  principle,  receptive  of  this  specific  form,  has 
a  natural  relation  to  the  fundamental  property  of  corporeal  things, 
viz.  quantity,  within  certain  more  or  less  determinate  limits. 
The  form  is  rendered  incommunicable  by  its  reception  in  the 
matter.  This  concrete  realization  of  the  form  in  the  matter  is 
individually  distinct  and  separate  from  other  realizations  of  the 
same  specific  form,  by  the  fact  that  the  matter  of  this  realization 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  Disp.  ii.,  cap.  2,  §  iii.,  pp.  271-3. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  129 

demands  certain  dimensions  of  quantity:  this  latter  property 
being  the  root-principle  of  numerical  multiplication  of  corporeal 
individuals  within  the  same  species. 

On  the  other  hand,  incorporeal  substances  such  as  angels  or 
pure  spirits,  being  "  pure "  forms,  "forma  subsistentes"  wholly 
and  essentially  unallied  with  any  determinable  material  principle, 
are  of  themselves  not  only  specific  but  individual ;  they  are  them- 
selves essentially  incommunicable,  superior  to  all  multiplication 
or  repeated  realization  of  themselves :  they  are  such  that  each 
can  be  actualized  only  "  once  and  for  all "  :  each  is  a  species  in 
itself:  it  is  the  full,  exhaustive,  and  adequate  expression  of  a 
divine  type,  of  an  exemplar  in  the  Divine  Mind  :  its  realization  is 
not,  like  that  of  a  material  form,  the  actuation  of  an  indefinitely 
determinable  material  principle  :  it  sums  up  and  exhausts  the  im- 
itable  perfection  of  the  specific  type  in  its  single  individuality, 
whereas  the  perfection  of  the  specific  type  of  a  corporeal  thing 
cannot  be  adequately  expressed  in  any  single  individual  realiza- 
tion, but  only  by  repeated  realizations ;  nor  indeed  can  it  ever  be 
adequately,  exhaustively  expressed,  by  any  finite  multitude  of 
these. 

It  follows  that  in  regard  to  pure  spirits  the  individuating 
principle  and  the  specific  principle  are  not  only  really  but  also 
logically,  conceptually  identical ;  that  the  distinction  between 
individual  and  individual  is  here  properly  a  specific  distinction  ; 
that  it  can  be  described  as  numerical  only  in  an  analogical  sense, 
if  by  numerical  we  mean  material  or  quantitative,  i.e.  the  distinc- 
tion between  corporeal  individuals  of  the  same  species  (28). 

But  the  distinction  between  individual  human  souls  is  not  a 
specific  or  formal  distinction.  These,  though  spiritual,  are  not 
pure  spirits.  They  are  spiritual  substances  which,  of  their  very 
nature,  are  essentially  ordained  for  union  with  matter.  They 
all  belong  to  the  same  species — the  human  species.  But  they  do 
not  constitute  individuals  of  this  species  unless  as  existing  actu- 
ally united  with  matter.  Each  human  soul  has  a  transcendental 
relation  to  its  own  body,  to  the  "  materia  signata  "  for  which,  and 
in  which,  it  was  created.  For  each  human  soul  this  relation  is 
unique.  Just  as  it  is  the  material  principle  of  each  human  being, 
the  matter  as  allied  to  quantitative  dimensions,  that  individuates 
the  man,  so  it  is  the  unique  relation  of  his  soul  to  the  material 
principle  thus  spatially  determined,  that  individuates  his  soul. 
Now  the  soul,  even  when  disembodied  and  existing  after  death, 

9 


130  ONTOLOGY 

necessarily  retains  in  its  very  constitution  this  essential  relation 
to  its  own  body ;  and  thus  it  is  that  disembodied  souls,  though 
not  actually  allied  with  matter,  remain  numerically  distinct  and 
individuated  in  virtue  of  their  essential  relation,  each  to  its  own 
body.  We  see,  therefore,  that  human  souls,  though  spiritual, 
are  an  entirely  different  order  of  beings,  and  must  be  conceived 
quite  differently,  from  pure  spirits. 

We  must  be  content  with  this  brief  exposition  of  the  Thomistic  doctrine 
on  individuation.  A  discussion  of  the  arguments  for  and  against  it  would 
carry  us  too  far.1  There  is  no  doubt  that  what  reveals  the  individuality  of 
the  corporeal  substance  to  us  is  its  material  principle,  in  virtue  of  which  its 
existence  is  circumscribed  within  certain  limits  of  time  and  space  and  affected 
with  individual  characteristics,  "  notae  individuantes ".  But  the  Thomistic 
doctrine,  which  finds  in  "  materia  signata  "  the  formal,  intrinsic,  constitutive 
principle  of  individuation,  goes  much  deeper.  It  is  intimately  connected  with 
the  Aristotelian  theory  of  knowledge  and  reality.  According  to  this  philosophy 
the  formative  principle  or  ei&oy,  the  forma  subtantialis,  is  our  sole  key  to  the 
intelligibility  of  corporeal  things  :  these  are  intelligible  in  so  far  forth  as  they 
are  actual,  and  they  are  actual  in  virtue  of  their  "  forms ".  Hence  the 
tendency  of  the  scholastic  commentators  of  Aristotle  to  use  the  term  "  form  "  as 
synonymous  with  the  term  "  nature,"  though  the  whole  nature  of  the  corporeal 
substance  embraces  the  material  as  well  as  the  formal  principle :  for  even 
though  it  does,  we  can  understand  nothing  about  this  "  nature  "  beyond  what  is 
intelligible  in  it  in  virtue  of  its  "  form  ".  The  material  principle,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  the  potential,  indeterminate  principle,  in  itself  unintelligible.  We 
know  that  in  ancient  Greek  philosophy  it  was  regarded  as  the  oAo-yoi/,  the 
surd  and  contingent  principle  in  things,  the  element  which  resisted  rational 
analysis  and  fell  outside  the  scope  of  "  science,"  or  "  knowledge  of  the 
necessary  and  universal  ".  While  it  revealed  the  forms  or  natures  of  things 
to  sense,  it  remained  itself  impervious  to  intellect,  which  grasped  these 
natures  and  rendered  them  intelligible  only  by  divesting  them  of  matter,  by 
abstracting  them  from  matter.  Reality  is  intelligible  only  in  so  far  forth  as 
it  is  immaterial,  either  in  fact  or  by  abstraction.  The  human  intellect,  being 
itself  spiritual,  is  "receptive  of  forms  without  matter".  But  being  itself 
allied  with  matter,  its  proper  object  is  none  other  than  the  natures  or  essences 
of  corporeal  things,  abstracted,  however,  from  the  matter  in  which  they  are 
actually  "  immersed  ".  The  only  reason,  therefore,  why  any  intelligible  form 
or  essence  which,  as  abstract  and  universal,  is  "  one "  for  intellect,  is  never- 
theless actually  or  potentially  "  manifold  "  in  its  reality,  is  because  it  is  allied 
with  a  material  principle.  It  is  the  latter  that  accounts  for  the  numerical 
multiplication,  in  actual  reality,  of  any  intelligible  form  or  essence.  If  the 
latter  is  material  it  can  be  actualized  only  by  indefinitely  repeated,  numerically 

1  These  will  easily  be  found  in  any  of  the  fuller  scholastic  treatises.  Cf.  URRABURU, 
op.  cit.,  Disp.  ii.,  cap.  2,  art.  4.  Philosophia  Lacencis,  Logica,  §§  1282  sqq. ;  MERCIER, 
Ontologie,  §§  36-42 ;  KLEUTGEN,  Philosophic  Scolastique,  §§  610  sqq. ;  BULLIAT, 
Thcesaurus  Philosophies  Thomisticae  (Nantes,  1899),  pp.  171  sqq. — a  useful  book  of 
reference  for  the  teaching  of  St.  Thomas. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  131 

or  materially  distinct,  alliances  with  matter.  It  cannot  be  actualized  "  tota 
simul"  or  "once  for  all,"  as  it  were.  It  is,  therefore,  the  material  principle 
that  not  merely  reveals,  but  also  constitutes,  the  individuation  of  such  corporeal 
forms  or  essences.  Hence,  too,  the  individual  as  such  cannot  be  adequately 
apprehended  by  intellect ;  for  all  intelligible  principles  of  reality  are  formal, 
whereas  the  individuating  principle  is  material. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  an  intelligible  essence  or  form  be  purely  spiritual, 
wholly  unrelated  to  any  indeterminate,  material  principle,  it  must  be  "  one " 
not  alone  conceptually  or  logically  but  also  really  :  it  can  exist  only  as  "  one  "  : 
it  is  of  itself  individual :  it  can  be  differentiated  from  other  spiritual  essences 
not  materially  but  only  formally,  or,  in  other  words,  not  numerically  but  by  a 
distinction  which  is  at  once  individual  and  specific.  Two  pure  spirits  cannot 
be  "two"  numerically  and  "one"  specifically,  two  for  sense  and  one  for 
intellect,  as  two  men  are  :  if  they  are  distinct  at  all  they  must  be  distinct  for 
intellect,  i.e.  they  cannot  be  properly  conceived  as  two  members  of  the  same 
species. 

In  this  solution  of  the  question  it  is  not  easy  to  see  how  the  material 
principle,  which,  by  its  alliance  with  quantity,  individuates  the  form,  is  itself 
individuated  so  as  to  be  the  source  and  principle  of  a  multiplicity  of  numeric- 
ally distinct  and  incommunicable  realizations  of  this  form.  Perhaps  the 
most  that  can  be  said  on  this  point  is  that  we  must  conceive  quantity,  which 
is  the  fundamental  property  of  corporeal  reality,  as  being  itself  essentially 
divisible,  and  the  material  principle  as  deriving  from  its  essential  relation  to 
quantity  its  function  of  multiplying  the  same  specific  nature  numerically. 

Of  those  who  reject  the  Thomistic  doctrine  some  few  contend 
that  it  is  the  actual  existence  of  any  specific  nature  that  should  be 
conceived  as  individuating  the  latter.  No  doubt  the  universal 
as  such  cannot  exist ;  reality  in  order  to  exist  actually  must  be 
individual.  Yet  it  cannot  be  actual  existence  that  individuates  it. 
We  must  conceive  it  as  individual  before  conceiving  it  as  actually 
existent ;  and  we  can  conceive  it  as  individual  while  abstracting 
from  its  existence.  We  can  think,  for  instance,  of  purely  possible 
individual  men,  or  angels,  as  numerically  or  individually  distinct 
from  one  another.  Moreover,  what  individuates  the  nature  must  be 
essential  to  the  latter,  but  actual  existence  is  not  essential  to  any 
finite  nature.  Hence  actual  existence  cannot  be  the  principle  of 
individuation.1  Can  it  be  contended  fast  possible  existence  is  what 
individuates  reality  ?  No  ;  for  possible  existence  is  nothing  more 
than  intrinsic  capacity  to  exist  actually,  and  this  is  essential  to 
all  reality :  it  is  the  criterion  whereby  we  distinguish  real  being 

1  A  kindred  view  to  this  is  the  view  that  subsistence  ("  subsistentia"  "  sup- 
positalitas  ")  or  personality  (" personalitas  ")  is  the  principle  of  individuation.  We 
shall  see  later  in  what  subsistence  or  personality  is  supposed  to  consist.  Here  it  is 
sufficient  to  observe  that  the  individual  nature  as  such  has  not  necessarily  subsis- 
tence or  personality  ;  hence  it  cannot  be  individuated  by  this  latter, 

9* 


132  ONTOLOGY 

from  logical  being ;  but  real  being,  as  such,  is  indifferent  to  uni- 
versality or  individuality ;  as  far  as  the  simple  concept  of  real 
being  is  concerned  the  latter  may  be  either  universal  or  individ- 
ual ;  the  concept  abstracts  equally  from  either  condition  of 
being. 

The  vast  majority,  therefore,  of  those  who  reject  the  Thom- 
istic  doctrine  on  individuation,  support  the  view  that  what  in- 
dividuates any  nature  or  substance  is  simply  the  whole  reality, 
the  total  entity,  of  the  individual.  This  total  entity  of  the  in- 
dividual, though  really  identical  with  the  specific  nature,  must  be 
conceived  as  something  positive,  superadded  to  the  latter,  for  it 
involves  a  something  which  is  logically  or  mentally  distinct  from 
the  latter.  This  something  is  what  we  conceive  as  a  differentia 
individua,  after  the  analogy  of  the  differentia  specifica  which  con- 
tracts the  concept  of  the  genus  to  that  of  the  species ;  and  by 
Scotists  it  has  been  termed  "  haecceitas "  or  "  thisness  ".  With- 
out using  the  Scotist  terminology,  most  of  those  scholastics  who 
reject  the  Thomist  doctrine  on  this  point  advocate  the  present 
view.  The  individuality  or  "thisness"  of  the  individual  sub- 
stance is  regarded  as  having  no  special  principle  in  the  individual, 
other  than  the  whole  substantial  entity  of  the  latter.  If  the 
nature  is  simple  it  is  of  itself  individual ;  if  composite,  the  in- 
trinsic principles  from  which  it  results — i.e.  matter  and  form 
essentially  united — suffice  to  individuate  it. 

In  this  view,  therefore,  the  material  principle  of  any  individual 
man,  for  example,  is  numerically  and  individually  distinct  from 
that  of  any  other  individual,  of  itself  and  independently  of  its 
relation  either  to  the  formative  principle  or  to  quantity.  The 
formative  principle,  too,  is  individuated  of  itself  ,  and  not  by  the 
material  principle  which  is  really  distinct  from  it,  or  by  its  rela- 
tion to  this  material  principle.  Likewise  the  union  of  both 
principles,  which  is  a  substantial  mode  of  the  composite  substance, 
is  individuated  and  rendered  numerically  distinct  from  all  other 
unions  of  these  two  individual  principles,  not  by  either  or  both 
these,  but  by  itself.  And  finally,  the  individual  composite  sub- 
stance has  its  individuation  from  these  two  intrinsic  principles 
thus  individually  united. 

It  may  be  doubted,  perhaps,  whether  this  attempt  at  explaining  the  real, 
individual  "  manifoldness  "  of  what  is  "  one  "  for  intellect,  i.e.  the  universal, 
throws  any  real  light  upon  the  problem.  No  doubt,  every  element  or  factor 
which  is  grasped  by  intellect  in  its  analysis  of  reality — matter,  form,  sub- 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  133 

stance,  accident,  quantity,  nay,  even  "  individuality  "  itself — is  apprehended 
as  abstract  and  universal ;  and  if  we  hold  the  doctrine  of  Moderate  Realism, 
that  the  intellect  in  apprehending  the  universal  attains  to  reality,  and  not 
merely  to  a  logical  figment  of  its  own  creation,  the  problem  of  relating  in- 
telligibly the  reality  which  is  "one"  for  intellect  with  the  same  reality  as 
manifestly  "manifold"  in  its  concrete  realizations  for  sense,  is  a  genuine 
philosophical  problem.  To  say  that  what  individuates  any  real  essence  or 
nature,  what  deprives  it  of  the  "  oneness  "  and  "  universality  "  which  it  has 
for  intellect,  what  makes  it  "this,"  "that,"  or  "the  other"  incommunicable 
individual,  must  be  conceived  to  be  simply  the  whole  essential  reality  of  that 
nature  itself — leaves  us  still  in  ignorance  as  to  why  such  a  nature,  which  is 
really  "one  "  for  intellect,  can  be  really  "manifold"  in  its  actualizations  for 
sense  experience.  The  reason  why  the  nature  which  is  one  and  universal  for 
abstract  thought,  and  which  is  undoubtedly  not  a  logical  entity  but  a  reality 
capable  of  actual  existence,  can  be  actualized  as  a  manifold  of  distinct  in- 
dividuals, must  be  sought,  we  are  inclined  to  think,  in  the  relation  of  this 
nature  to  a  material  principle  in  alliance  with  quantity  which  is  the  source  of 
all  purely  numerical,  "  space  and  time  "  distinctions. 

33.  INDIVIDUATION  OF  ACCIDENTS.— The  rdle  of  quantity 
in  the  Thomistic  theory  of  individuation  suggests  the  question : 
How  are  accidents  themselves  individuated?  We  have  referred 
already  (29,  n.)  to  the  view  that  they  are  individuated  by  the  in- 
dividual subjects  or  substances  in  which  they  inhere.  If  we  dis- 
tinguish again  between  what  reveals  individuality  and  what  con- 
stitutes it,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  when  accidents  of  the  same 
kind  are  found  in  individually  distinct  subjects  what  reveals  the 
numerical  distinction  between  the  former  is  the  fact  that  they  are 
found  inhering  in  the  latter.  So,  also,  distinction  of  individual 
substances  is  the  extrinsic,  genetic,  or  causal  principle  of  the 
numerical  distinction  between  similar  accidents  arising  in  these 
substances.  But  when  the  same  kind  of  accident  recurs  succes- 
sively in  the  same  individual  substance — as,  for  example,  when  a 
man  performs  repeated  acts  of  the  same  kind — what  reveals  the 
numerical  or  individual  distinction  between  these  latter  cannot  be 
the  individual  substance,  for  it  is  one  and  the  same,  but  rather 
the  time  distinction  between  the  accidents  themselves. 

The  intrinsic  constitutive  principle  which  formally  individ- 
uates the  accidents  of  individually  distinct  substances  is,  according 
to  Thomists  generally,  their  essential  relation  to  the  individual 
substances  in  which  they  appear.  It  is  not  clear  how  this  theory 
can  be  applied  to  the  fundamental  accident  of  corporeal  substances. 
If  the  function  of  formally  individuating  the  corporeal  substance 
itself  is  to  be  ascribed  in  any  measure  to  quantity,  it  would  seem 


134  ONTOLOGY 

to  follow  that  this  latter  must  be  regarded  as  individuated  by 
itself,  by  its  own  total  entity  or  reality.  And  this  is  the  view 
held  by  most  other  scholastics  in  regard  to  the  individuation  of 
accidents  generally :  that  these,  like  substances,  are  individuated 
by  their  own  total  positive  reality. 

When  there  is  question  of  the  same  kind  of  accident  re- 
curring in  the  same  individual  subject,  the  "time"  distinction 
between  such  successive  individual  accidents  of  the  same  kind 
would  appear  not  merely  to  reveal  their  individuality  but  also  to 
indicate  a  different  relation  of  each  to  its  subject  as  existing  at 
that  particular  point  of  space  and  time :  so  that  the  relation  of 
the  accident  to  its  individual  subject,  as  here  and  now  existing  in 
the  concrete,  would  be  the  individuating  principle  of  the 
accident. 

Whether  a  number  of  accidents  of  the  same  species  infima, 
and  distinct  merely  numerically,  could  exist  simultaneously  in 
the  same  individual  subject,  is  a  question  on  which  scholastic 
philosophers  are  not  agreed :  the  negative  opinion,  which  has 
the  authority  of  St.  Thomas,  being  the  more  probable.  Those 
various  questions  on  the  individuation  of  accidents  will  be  better 
understood  from  a  subsequent  exposition  of  the  scholastic  doctrine 
on  accidents  (Ch.  viii.). 

It  may  be  well  to  remark  that  in  inquiring  about  the  individuation  of 
substances  and  accidents  we  have  been  considering  reality  from  a  static 
standpoint,  seeking  how  we  are  to  conceive  and  interpret  intellectually,  or 
for  abstract  thought,  the  relation  of  the  universal  to  the  individual.  If,  how- 
ever, we  ascribe  to  "  time  "  distinctions  any  function  in  individuating  accidents 
of  the  same  kind  in  the  same  individual  substance,  we  are  introducing  into 
our  analysis  the  kinetic  aspect  of  reality,  or  its  subjection  to  processes  of 
change. 

We  may  call  attention  here  to  a  few  other  questions  of  minor  import  dis- 
cussed by  scholastics.  First,  have  all  individuals  of  the  same  species  the 
same  substantial  perfection,  or  can  individuals  have  different  grades  of  sub- 
stantial perfection  within  the  same  species  ?  All  admit  the  obvious  fact  that 
individual  differs  from  individual  within  the  same  species  in  the  number, 
variety,  extent  and  intensity  of  their  accidental  properties  and  qualities.  But, 
having  the  human  soul  mainly  in  view,  they  disagree  as  to  whether  the 
substantial  perfection  of  the  specific  nature  can  be  actualized  in  different 
grades  in  different  individuals.  According  to  the  more  common  opinion 
there  cannot  be  different  substantial  grades  of  the  same  specific  nature,  for 
the  simple  reason  that  every  such  grade  of  substantial  perfection  should  be 
regarded  as  specific,  as  changing  the  species :  hence,  e.g.  all  human  souls 
are  substantially  equal  in  perfection.  This  view  is  obviously  based  upon 
th  e  conception  of  specific  types  or  essences  as  being,  after  the  analogy  of 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  135 

numbers,  immutable  when  considered  in  the  abstract.  And  it  seems  to  be 
confirmed  by  the  consideration  that  the  intrinsic  principle  of  individuation  is 
nothing,  or  adds  nothing,  really  distinct  from  the  specific  essence  itself. 

Another  question  in  connexion  with  individuation  has  derived  at  least 
an  historical  interest  from  the  notable  controversy  to  which  it  gave  rise  in 
the  seventeenth  century  between  Clarke  and  Leibniz.  The  latter,  in  accordance 
with  the  principles  of  his  system  of  philosophy, — the  Law  of  Sufficient  Reason 
and  the  Law  of  Continuity  among  the  monads  or  ultimate  principles  of 
being, — contended  that  two  individual  beings  so  absolutely  alike  as  to  be 
indiscernible  would  be  eo  ipso  identical^  in  other  words,  that  the  reality  of 
two  such  beings  is  impossible. 

Of  course  if  we  try  to  conceive  two  individuals  so  absolutely  alike  both 
in  essence  and  accidents,  both  in  the  abstract  and  in  the  concrete,  as  to  be 
indiscernible  either  by  our  senses  or  by  our  intellect,  or  by  any  intellect — 
even  the  Divine  Intellect — we  are  simply  conceiving  the  same  thing  twice 
over.  But  is  there  anything  impossible  or  contradictory  in  thinking  that  God 
could  create  two  perfectly  similar  beings,  distinct  from  each  other  only 
individually,  so  similar,  however,  that  neither  human  sense  nor  human 
intellect  could  apprehend  them  as  two,  but  only  as  one  ?  The  impossibility 
is  not  apparent.  Were  they  two  material  individuals  they  should,  of  course, 
occupy  the  same  space  in  order  to  have  similar  spatial  relations,  but 
impenetrability  is  not  essential  to  corporeal  substances.  And  even  in  the 
view  that  each  is  individuated  by  its  "  materia  signata"  it  is  not  impossible 
to  conceive  numerically  distinct  quantified  matters  allied  at  the  same  time  to 
the  same  dimensions  of  space.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  there  be  question  of 
two  pure  spirits,  absolutely  similar  specifically,  even  in  the  Thomistic  view 
that  here  the  individual  distinction  is  at  the  same  time  specific  there  seems  to 
be  no  sufficient  ground  for  denying  that  the  Divine  Omnipotence  could  create 
two  or  more  such  individually  (and  therefore  specifically)  distinct  spirits  : 1  such 
distinction  remaining,  of  course,  indiscernible  for  the  finite  human  intellect. 

The  argument  of  Leibniz,  that  there  would  be  no  sufficient  reason  for 
the  creation  of  two  such  indiscernible  beings,  and  that  it  would  therefore  be 
repugnant  to  the  Divine  Wisdom,  is  extrinsic  to  the  question  of  their  intrinsic 
possibility  :  if  they  be  intrinsically  possible  they  cannot  be  repugnant  to  any 
attribute  of  the  Divinity,  either  to  the  Divine  Omnipotence  or  to  the  Divine 
Wisdom. 

34.  IDENTITY. — Considering  the  order  in  which  we  acquire  our 
ideas  we  are  easily  convinced  that  the  notion  of  finite  being  is 
antecedent  to  that  of  infinite  being.  Moreover,  it  is  from  re- 
flection on  finite  beings  that  we  arrive  at  the  most  abstract 
notion  of  being  in  general.  We  make  the  object  of  this  latter 
notion  definite  only  by  dividing  it  off  mentally  from  nothingness, 
conceived  per  modum  entts,  or  as  an  ens  rationis.  Thus  the 
natural  way  of  making  our  concepts  definite  is  by  limiting  them  ; 
it  is  only  when  we  come  to  reflect  on  the  necessary  implications 

1  The  consistent  attitude  for  the  Thomist  here  would,  however,  appear  to  be 
a  denial  that  such  a  thing  would  be  intrinsically  possible. 


136  ONTOLOGY 

of  our  concept  of  "  infinite  being  "  that  we  realize  the  possi- 
bility of  conceiving  a  being  which  is  definite  without  being 
really  limited,  which  is  definite  by  the  very  fact  of  its  infinity,  by 
its  possession  of  unlimited  perfection ;  and  even  then  our  im- 
perfect human  mode  of  conceiving  "  infinite  being  "  is  helped  by 
distinguishing  or  dividing  it  off  from  all  finite  being  and  con- 
trasting it  with  the  latter.  All  this  goes  to  prove  the  truth  of 
the  teaching  of  St.  Thomas,  that  the  mental  function  of  dividing 
or  distinguishing  precedes  our  concepts  of  unity  and  multitude. 
Now  the  concepts  of  identity  and  distinction  are  closely  allied 
with  those  of  unity  and  multitude  ;  but  they  add  something  to 
these  latter.  When  we  think  of  a  being  as  one  we  must  analyse 
it  further,  look  at  it  under  different  aspects,  and  compare  it  with 
itself,  before  we  can  regard  it  as  the  same  or  identical  with  itself. 
Or,  at  least,  we  must  think  of  it  twice  and  compare  it  with  itself 
in  the  affirmative  judgment  "  This  is  itself,"  "  A  is  A,"  thus 
formulating  the  logical  Principle  of  Identity,  in  order  to  come 
into  possession  of  the  concept  of  identity.1  Every  affirmative 
categorical  judgment  asserts  identity  of  the  predicate  with  the 
subject  ("  S  is  P  ")  :  asserts,  in  other  words,  that  what  we  appre- 
hend under  the  notion  of  the  predicate  (P)  is  really  identical  with 
what  we  have  apprehended  under  the  distinct  notion  of  the 
subject  (S).  The  synthetic  function  of  the  affirmative  categorical 
judgment  identifies  in  the  real  order  what  the  analytic  function  of 
mental  abstraction  had  separated  in  the  logical  order.  By  saying 
that  the  affirmative  categorical  judgment  asserts  identity  we 
mean  that  by  asserting  that  "this  is  that,"  "  man  is  rational  "  we 
identify  "this"  with  "that,"  "man"  with  "  rational,"  thus 
denying  that  they  are  two,  that  they  are  distinct,  that  they  differ. 
Identity  is  one  of  those  elementary  concepts  which  cannot  be 
defined  ;  but  perhaps  we  may  describe  it  as  the  logical  relation 
through  which  the  mind  asserts  the  objects  of  two  or  more  of  its 
thoughts  to  be  really  one. 

If  the  object  formally  represented  by  each  of  the  concepts  is 
one  and  the  same — as,  e.g.  when  we  compare  "  A  "  with  "  A"  or 
"  man  "  with  "  rational  animal,"  or,  in  general,  any  object  with 
its  definition — the  identity  is  both  real  and  logical  (or  conceptual, 
formal).  If  the  concepts  differ  in  their  formal  objects  while 

1  Hujusmodi  relatio  non  potest  consistere  nisi  in  quodam  ordine,  quern  ratio 
adinvenit  alicujus  ad  seipsum  secundum  aliquas  ejus  duas  considerationes. — ST. 
THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.t  i.,  q.  xxviii.,  art.  3,  ad.  2  am. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  137 

representing  one  and  the  same  reality — as  when  we  compare 
"  St.  Peter  "  with  ((head  of  the  apostles,"  or  "  man  "  with  "  rational  " 
—the  identity  is  real,  but  not  logical  or  formal.  Finally,  if  we 
represent  two  or  more  realities,  "  John,  James,  Thomas,"  by  the 
same  formal  concept,  "  man,"  the  identity  is  merely  logical  or 
formal,  not  real.  Of  these  three  kinds  of  identity  the  first  is  some- 
times called  adequate,  the  second  and  third  inadequate. 

Logical  identity  may  be  specific  or  generic,  according  as  we 
identify  really  distinct  individuals  under  one  specific  concept,  or 
really  distinct  species  or  classes  under  one  generic  concept. 
Again,  it  may  be  essential  or  accidental,  according  as  the  abstract 
and  universal  class-concept  under  which  really  distinct  members 
are  classified  represents  a  common  part  of  the  essence  of  these 
members  or  only  a  common  property  or  accident.  Thus  John, 
James  and  Thomas  are  essentially  identical  in  their  human  nature  ; 
they  are  accidentally  identical  in  being  all  three  fair-haired  and 
six  feet  in  height.  Logical  identity  under  the  concept  of  quality 
is  based  on  the  real  relation  of  similarity  ;  logical  identity  under 
the  concept  of  quantity  is  based  on  the  real  relation  of  equality. 
When  we  say  that  essential  (logical)  identity  (e.g.  the  identity  of 
John,  James  and  Thomas  under  the  concept  of  "  man  ")  is  based 
on  the  fact  that  the  really  distinct  individuals  have  really  similar 
natures,  we  merely  mean  that  our  knowledge  of  natures  or 
essences  is  derived  from  our  knowledge  of  qualities,  taking 
"  qualities  "  in  the  wide  sense  of  "  accidents  "  generally  :  that  the 
properties  and  activities  of  things  are  our  only  key  to  the  nature 
of  these  things  :  Operari  sequitur  esse.  It  is  not  implied,  nor  is 
it  true,  that  real  similarity  is  a  partial  real  identity :  it  is  but  the 
ground  of  a  partial  logical  identity, — identity  under  the  common 
concept  of  some  quality  (in  the  wide  sense  of  this  term).  For 
example,  the  height  of  John  is  as  really  distinct  from  that  of 
James  as  the  humanity  of  John  is  from  that  of  James.  If,  then, 
individual  things  are  really  distinct,  how  is  it  that  we  can  re- 
present (even  inadequately)  a  multitude  of  them  by  one  concept  ? 
To  say  that  we  can  do  so  because  they  reveal  themselves  to  us 
as  similar  to  one  another  is  to  say  what  is  undoubtedly  true  ; 
but  this  does  not  solve  the  problem  of  the  relation  between  the 
universal  and  the  individual  in  human  experience :  rather  it 
places  us  face  to  face  with  this  problem. 

Reverting  now  to  real  identity :  whatever  we  can  predicate 
affirmatively  about  a  being  considered  as  one,  and  as  subject  of  a 


I38  ONTOLOGY 

judgment,  we  regard  as  really  identical  with  that  being.  We 
cannot  predicate  a  real  part  of  its  real  whole,  or  vice  versa.  But 
our  concepts,  when  compared  together  in  judgment,  bear  logical 
relations  of  extension  and  intension  to  each  other,  that  is,  relations 
of  logical  part  to  logical  whole.  Thus,  the  logical  identity  of 
subject  and  predicate  in  the  affirmative  judgment  may  be  only  in- 
adequate^ But  the  real  identity  underlying  the  affirmative  judg- 
ment is  an  adequate  real  identity.  When  we  say,  for  example, 
that  "  Socrates  is  wise,"  we  mean  that  the  object  of  our  concept 
of  "  wisdom  "  is  in  this  case  really  and  adequately  identical  with 
the  object  of  our  concept  of  "  Socrates  "  :  in  other  words  that 
we  are  conceiving  one  and  the  same  real  being  under  two  dis- 
tinct concepts,  each  of  which  represents,  more  or  less  adequately, 
the  whole  real  being,  and  one  of  them  in  this  case  less  adequately 
than  the  other. 

We  have  to  bear  in  mind  that  while  considering  being  as  one 
or  manifold,  identical  or  distinct,  we  are  thinking  of  it  in  its  static 
mode,  as  an  object  of  abstract  thought,  not  in  its  dynamic  and 
kinetic  mode  as  actually  existing  in  space  and  time,  and  subject 
to  change.  It  is  the  identity  of  being  with  itself  when  considered 
in  this  static,  unchanging  condition,  that  is  embodied  in  the 
logical  Principle  of  Identity.  In  order,  therefore,  that  this 
principle  may  find  its  application  to  being  or  reality  as  subject  to 
actual  change — and  this  is  the  state  in  which  de  facto  reality  is 
presented  to  us  as  an  immediate  datum  of  experience — we  must 
seize  upon  the  changing  reality  and  think  of  it  in  an  indivisible 
instant  apart  from  the  change  to  which  it  is  actually  subject; 
only  thus  does  the  Principle  of  Identity  apply  to  it — as  being,  not 
as  becoming,  not  in  fieri,  but  in  facto  esse.  The  Principle  of 
Identity,  which  applies  to  all  real  being,  whether  possible  or 
actual,  tells  us  simply  that  "  a  thing  is  what  it  is  ".  But  for  the 
understanding  of  actual  being  as  subject  to  real  change  we  must 
supplement  the  Principle  of  Identity  by  another  principle  which 
tells  us  that  such  an  actual  being  not  only  is  actually  what  it  is 
(Principle  of  Identity),  but  also  that  it  is  potentially  something 
other  than  what  it  actually  is,  that  it  is  potentially  what  it  can 
become  actually  (Ch.  ii.). 

We  have  seen  that,  since  change  is  not  continuous  annihila- 
tion and  creation,  the  changing  being  must  in  some  real  and 
true  sense  persist  throughout  the  process  of  change.  It  is  from 

lCf.  Science  of  Logic,  vol.  i.,  §  59. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  139 

experience  of  change  we  derive  our  notion  of  time-duration  ;  and 
the  concept  of  permanence  or  stability  throughout  change  gives 
us  the  notion  of  a  real  sameness  or  abiding  self-identity  which  is 
compatible  with  real  change.  But  a  being  which  persists  in  ex- 
istence is  identical  with  itself  throughout  its  duration  only  in 
so  far  forth  as  it  has  not  changed.  Only  the  Necessary  Being, 
whose  duration  is  absolutely  exempt  from  all  change,  is  ab- 
solutely or  metaphysically  identical  with  Himself :  His  duration 
is  eternity — which  is  one  perpetual,  unchanging  now.  A  being 
which  persists  unchanged  in  its  essence  or  nature,  which 
is  exempt  from  substantial  change,  but  which  is  subject  to 
accidental  change,  to  a  succession  of  accidental  qualities  such 
as  vital  actions — such  a  being  is  said  to  retain  its  physical 
identity  with  itself  throughout  those  changes.  Such,  for  in- 
stance, is  the  identity  of  the  human  soul  with  itself,  or  of  any 
individual  living  thing  during  its  life,  or  even  of  an  inorganic 
material  substance  as  long  as  it  escapes  substantial  change. 
Finally,  the  persisting  identity  of  a  collection  of  beings,  united 
by  some  moral  bond  so  as  to  form  a  moral  unit,  is  spoken  of  as 
moral  identity  as  long  as  the  bond  remains,  even  though  the  con- 
stituent members  may  be  constantly  disappearing  to  be  replaced 
by  others :  as  in  a  nation,  a  religious  society,  a  legal  corporation, 
etc. 

35.  DISTINCTION. — Distinction  is  the  correlative  of  identity ; 
it  is  the  absence  or  negation  of  the  latter.  We  express  the  rela- 
tion called  distinction  by  the  negative  judgment,  "  this  is  not 
that"  ;  it  is  the  relation  of  a  being  to  whatever  is  not  itself,  the 
relation  of  one  to  other. 

Distinction  may  be  either  adequate  or  inadequate,  according 
as  we  distinguish  one  total  object  of  thought  from  another  total 
object,  or  only  from  a  part  of  itself.  For  example,  the  distinction 
between  John  and  James  is  an  adequate  real  distinction,  while 
that  between  John  and  his  body  is  an  inadequate  real  distinction  ; 
the  distinction  between  John's  rationality  and  his  animality  is  an 
adequate  logical  distinction,  while  the  distinction  between  either 
of  these  and  his  humanity  is  an  inadequate  logical  disinction. 

We  have  already  (23)  briefly  explained  and  illustrated  the 
most  important  classification  of  distinctions :  that  into  real  and 
logical ;  the  sub-division  of  the  latter  into  purely  logical  and 
virtual ;  and  of  the  latter  again  into  perfect  (complete,  adequate) 
and  imperfect  (incomplete,  inadequate).  But  the  theory  there 


140  ONTOLOGY 

briefly  outlined  calls  for  some  further  analysis  and  amplifica- 
tion. 

36.  LOGICAL  DISTINCTIONS  AND  THEIR  GROUNDS. — The 
purely  logical  distinction  must  not  be  confounded  with  a  mere 
verbal  distinction,  e.g.  that  between  an  "  edifice  "  and  a  "  building," 
or  between  "  truthfulness  "  and  "  veracity  ".  A  logical  distinction 
is  a  distinction  in  the  concepts :  these  must  represent  one  and  the 
same  reality  but  in  different  ways  :  the  one  may  be  more  explicit, 
more  fully  analysed  than  the  other,  as  a  definition  is  in  compari- 
son with  the  thought-object  defined ;  or  the  one  may  represent 
the  object  less  adequately  than  the  other,  as  when  we  compare 
(in  intension)  the  concepts  "  man  "  and  "  animal " ;  or  the  one 
may  be  predicated  of  the  other  in  an  affirmative  judgment ;  or 
the  one  may  represent  the  object  as  concrete  and  individual,  the 
other  the  same  object  as  abstract  and  universal.1 

Comparing,  in  the  next  place,  the  purely  logical  with  the 
virtual  distinction,  we  see  that  the  grounds  for  making  these  dis- 
tinctions are  different.  Every  distinction  made  by  the  mind 
must  have  an  intelligible  ground  or  reason  of  some  sort — &funda- 
mentum  distinctionis.  Now  in  the  case  of  the  purely  logical 
distinction  the  ground  is  understood  to  consist  exclusively  in  the 
needs  of  the  mind  itself — needs  which  spring  from  the  mind's 
own  limitations  when  confronted  with  the  task  of  understanding  or 
interpreting  reality,  of  making  reality  intelligible.  Purely  logical 
distinctions  are  therefore  seen  to  be  a  class  of  purely  logical  re- 
lations, i.e.  of  those  entia  rationis  which  the  mind  must  construct 
for  itself  in  its  effort  to  understand  the  real.  They  have  no  other 
reality  as  objects  of  thought  than  the  reality  they  derive  from  the 
constitutive  or  constructive  activity  of  the  mind.  They  are 
modes,  or  forms,  or  terms,  of  the  cognitive  activity  itself,  not  of 

1  It  is  only  the  concrete  and  individual  that  as  such  can  exist  actually ;  the  abstract 
and  universal  as  such  cannot  exist  actually  :  abstractness  and  universality  are  mental 
modes — entia  rationis — annexed  by  the  mind  to  the  real  content  of  its  concepts : 
considered  as  thought-objects  they  are  themselves  not  real  entities  :  they  do  not 
affect  reality  as  given  to  us  in  our  experience.  But  perhaps  concreteness  and 
individuality  are  also  mere  mental  modes,  affecting  reality  not  as  given  to  us  in  our 
experience  but  only  as  subjected  to  the  process  of  intellectual  conception,  or  at  least 
as  subjected  to  the  process  of  sense  perception  ?  This  would  appear  to  be  part  of 
the  general  Kantian  theory  of  knowledge  :  that  we  can  apprehend  reality  as  concrete 
and  individual  only  because  space  and  time,  which  characterize  the  concrete  and 
individual  mode  of  being,  are  mental  modes  which  must  be  applied  to  reality  as  a 
prerequisite  condition  for  rendering  the  latter  capable  of  apprehension  in  our  experi- 
ence. This  contention  is  examined  in  another  context.  Cf.  infra,  pp.  145,  147, 151. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  141 

the  reality  which  is  the  object  apprehended  and  contemplated  by 
means  of  this  cognitive  activity. 

The  virtual  distinction,  on  the  other  hand,  although  it  also, 
as  an  object  of  thought,  is  only  an  ens  rationis — inasmuch  as 
there  is  no  real  duality  or  plurality  corresponding  to  it  in  the 
reality  into  which  the  mind  introduces  it,  this  reality  being  a  real 
unity — the  virtual  distinction  is  considered,  nevertheless,  to  have 
a  ground,  or  reason,  or  foundation  (for  making  and  introducing 
it)  in  the  nature  of  this  one  reality ;  that  is,  it  is  regarded  as 
having  a  real  foundation,  a  fundamentum  in  re.  In  so  far,  there- 
fore, as  our  knowledge  is  permeated  by  virtual  distinctions,  reality 
cannot  be  said  to  be  formally  >  but  only  fundamentally  what  this 
knowledge  represents  it  to  be.  Does  this  fact  interfere  with  the 
objective  validity  of  our  knowledge  ?  Not  in  the  least ;  for  we 
do  not  ascribe  to  the  reality  the  distinctions,  and  other  such 
modes  or  forms,  which  we  know  by  reflection  to  be  formally 
characteristic  not  of  things  but  of  our  thought  or  cognition  of  things. 
Our  knowledge,  therefore,  so  far  as  it  goes,  may  be  a  faithful  ap- 
prehension of  reality,  even  though  it  be  itself  affected  by  modes 
not  found  in  the  reality. 

But  what  is  this  real  foundation  of  the  virtual  distinction? 
What  is  the fundamentu m  in  re?  It  is  not  a  real  or  objective 
duality  in  virtue  of  which  we  could  say  that  there  are,  in  the  ob- 
ject of  our  thought,  two  beings  or  realities  one  of  which  is  not 
the  other.  Such  duality  would  cause  a  real  distinction.  But 
just  here  the  difficulties  of  our  analysis  begin  to  arise :  for  we 
have  to  fix  our  attention  on  actually  existing  realities ;  and,  as- 
suming that  each  and  every  one  of  these  is  an  individual,  we 
have  to  bear  in  mind  the  relation  of  the  real  to  the  actual,  of 
reality  as  abstract  and  universal  to  reality  as  concrete  and  indi- 
vidual, of  the  simple  to  the  composite,  of  the  stable  to  the  chang- 
ing, of  essential  to  accidental  unity — in  any  and  every  attempt 
to  discriminate  in  detail  between  a  real  and  a  virtual  distinction. 
Nor  is  it  easy  to  lay  down  any  general  test  which  will  serve  even 
theoretically  to  discriminate  between  them.  Let  us  see  what 
grounds  have  been  mainly  suggested  as  real  foundations  for  the 
virtual  distinction. 

If  a  being  which  is  not  only  one  but  simple,  manifests,  in  the 
superior  grade  of  being  to  which  it  belongs,  a  perfection  which 
is  equivalent  to  many  lesser  perfections  found  really  distinct  and 
separate  elsewhere,  in  separate  beings  of  an  inferior  order,  this  is 


142  ONTOLOGY 

considered  a  sufficient  real  ground  for  considering  the  former 
being,  though  really  one  and  simple,  as  virtually  manifold.1 
The  human  soul,  as  being  virtually  threefold — rational,  sentient 
and  vegetative — is  a  case  in  point :  but  only  on  the  assumption 
that  the  soul  of  the  individual  man  can  be  proved  to  be  one  and 
simple.  This,  of  course,  all  scholastics  regard  as  capable  of 
proof:  even  those  of  them  who  hold  that  the  powers  or  faculties 
whereby  it  immediately  manifests  these  three  grades  of  perfection 
are  accidental  realities,  really  distinct  from  one  another  and  from 
the  substance  of  the  soul  itself. 

Again,  the  being  which  is  the  object  of  our  thought  may  be 
so  rich  in  reality  or  perfection  that  our  finite  minds  cannot 
adequately  grasp  it  by  any  one  mental  intuition,  but  must  pro- 
ceed discursively,  by  analysis  and  abstraction,  taking  in  partial 
aspects  of  it  successively  through  inadequate  concepts ;  while 
realizing  that  these  aspects,  these  objects  of  our  distinct  concepts, 
are  only  partial  aspects  of  one  and  the  same  real  being.  This, 
in  fact,  is  our  common  experience.  But  the  theory  assumes  that 
we  are  able  to  determine  when  these  objects  of  our  concepts  are 
only  mental  aspects  of  one  reality,  and  when  they  are  several 
separate  realities ;  nay,  even,  that  we  can  determine  whether  or 
not  they  are  really  distinct  entities  united  together  to  form  one 
composite  individual  being,  or  only  mentally  distinct  views  of 
one  simple  individual  being.  For  example,  it  is  assumed  that 
while  the  distinction  between  the  sentient  and  the  rational  grades 
of  being  in  a  human  individual  can  be  shown  to  be  only  a  virtual 
distinction,  that  between  the  body  and  the  soul  of  the  same 
individual  can  be  shown  to  be  a  real  distinction  ;  or,  again,  that 
while  the  distinction  between  essence,  intellect,  and  will  in  God, 
can  be  shown  to  be  only  a  virtual  distinction,  that  between 
essence,  intellect,  and  will  in  man,  can  be  shown  to  be  a  real 
distinction. 

37.  THE  VIRTUAL  DISTINCTION  AND  THE  REAL  DISTINC- 
TION.— Now  scholastics  differ  considerably  in  classifying  this, 
that,  or  the  other  distinction,  as  logical  or  as  real ;  but  this  does 

1  Thus  the  recognition  of  a  virtual  distinction  in  a  being  is  a  sign  of  the  relative 
perfection  of  the  latter :  the  being  involves  in  its  higher  sort  of  unity  perfections 
elsewhere  dispersed  and  separate.  The  being  is  of  a  higher  order  than  if  the 
principles  of  these  perfections  in  it  were  really  distinct  from  one  another.  But  the 
virtual  distinction  also  seems  to  imply  a  relative  imperfection  when  it  is  found  in 
creatures,  inasmuch  as  here  the  thought-objects  so  distinguished  are  always 
principles  of  a  plurality  of  really  distinct  accidental  perfections  :  and  real  plurality  in 
a  being  is  less  perfect  than  unity. — C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  633. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  143 

not  prove  that  it  is  impossible  ever  to  determine  with  certitude 
whether  any  particular  distinction  is  logical  or  real.  What  we 
are  looking  for  just  now  is  a  general  test  for  discriminating,  if 
such  can  be  found.  And  this  brings  us  to  a  consideration  of  the 
test  suggested  in  the  very  definitions  themselves.  At  first  sight 
it  would  appear  to  be  an  impracticable,  if  not  even  an  unintel- 
ligible test :  "  The  distinction  is  real  if  it  exists  in  the  reality — 
i.e.  if  the  reality  is  two  (or  more)  beings^  not  one  being — antece- 
dently to,  or  independently  of,  the  consideration  of  the  mind ; 
otherwise  the  distinction  is  logical ".  But — it  might  be  objected 
—how  can  we  possibly  know  whether  or  not  any  object  of  per- 
ception or  thought  is  one  or  more  than  one  antecedently  to,  or 
independently  of,  the  consideration  of  the  mind  ?  It  is  certainly 
impossible  for  us  to  know  what,  or  what  kind,  reality  is,  or 
whether  it  is  one  or  manifold,  apart  from  and  prior  to,  the 
exercise  of  our  own  cognitive  activity.  This,  therefore,  cannot 
be  what  the  test  means :  to  interpret  it  in  such  a  sense  would  be 
absurd.  But  when  we  have  perceived  reality  in  our  actual  sense 
experience,  when  we  have  interpreted  it,  got  the  meaning  of 
it,  made  it  intelligible,  and  actually  understood  it,  by  the  spon- 
taneous exercise  of  intellect,  the  judging  and  reasoning  faculty : 
then,  obviously,  we  are  at  liberty  to  reflect  critically  on  those 
antecedent  spontaneous  processes,  on  the  knowledge  which  is 
the  result  of  them,  and  the  reality  which  is  known  through  them  ; 
and  by  such  critical  reflection  on  those  processes,  their  objects 
and  their  products,  on  the  "  reality  as  perceived  and  known  "  and 
on  the  "perceiving"  and  "knowing"  of  it,  we  may  be  able  to 
distinguish  between  two  classes  of  contributions  to  the  total 
result  which  is  the  "  known  reality " :  those  which  we  must  re- 
gard as  purely  mental,  as  modes  or  forms  or  subjectively  con- 
structed terms  of  the  mental  function  of  cognition  itself  (whether 
perceptual  or  conceptual),  and  those  which  we  must  regard  as 
given  or  presented  to  the  mind  as  objects,  which  are  not  in  any 
sense  constructed  or  contributed  by  the  mind,  which,  therefore, 
are  what  they  are  independently  of  our  mental  activity,  and 
which  would  be  and  remain  what  they  are,  and  what  we  have 
apprehended  them  to  be,  even  if  we  had  never  perceived  or 
thought  of  them.  This,  according  to  the  scholastics,  is  the  sense 
— and  it  is  a  perfectly  intelligible  sense — in  which  we  are  called 
on  to  decide  whether  the  related  terms  of  any  given  distinction 
have  been  merely  rendered  distinct  by  the  Analytic  activity  of 


144  ONTOLOGY 

the  cognitive  process,  or  are  themselves  distinct  realities  irrespec- 
tive of  this  process.  That  it  is  possible  to  carry  on  successfully,  at 
least  to  some  extent,  this  work  of  discrimination  between  the 
subjective  and  the  objective  factors  of  our  cognitive  experience, 
can  scarcely  be  denied.  It  is  what  philosophers  in  every  age 
have  been  attempting.  There  are,  however,  some  distinctions 
about  the  nature  of  which  philosophers  have  never  been  able  to 
agree,  some  holding  them  to  be  real,  others  to  be  only  virtual : 
the  former  view  being  indicative  of  the  tendency  to  emphasize 
the  r61e  of  cognition  as  a  passive  representation  of  objectively 
given  reality ;  the  latter  view  being  an  expression  of  the  opposite 
tendency  to  emphasize  the  active  or  constitutive  or  constructive 
factors  whereby  cognition  assimilates  to  the  mind's  own  mode  of 
being  the  reality  given  to  it  in  experience.  In  all  cognition  there 
is  an  assimilation  of  reality  and  mind,  of  object  and  subject. 
When  certain  distinctions  are  held  to  be  real  this  consideration 
is  emphasized :  that  in  the  cognitive  process,  as  such,  it  is  the 
mind  that  is  assimilated  to  the  objective  reality.1  When  these 
same  distinctions  are  held  to  be  logical  this  other  consideration 
is  emphasized :  that  in  the  cognitive  process  reality  must  also 
be  assimilated  to  mind,  must  be  mentalized  so  to  speak : 
Cognitum  est  in  cognoscente  secundum  modum  cognoscentis :  that 
in  this  process  the  mind  must  often  regard  what  is  one  reality 
under  distinct  aspects :  and  that  if  we  regard  these  distinct  aspects 
as  distinct  realities  we  are  violating  the  principle,  Entia  non 
sunt  multiplicanda  praeter  necessitatem. 

Now  those  philosophers  who  hold  certain  distinctions  to  be  virtual,  and 
not  real,  thereby  ascribe  to  cognitive  experience  a  larger  sphere  of  constitutive 

1"Omnis  cognitio  est  a  potentia  et  objecto,  sive  a  cognoscente  et  cognito. 
Ratio  a  priori  est,  quia  omnis  cognitio  saltern  creata  est  expressio  et  imitatio  atque 
imago  vitalis  objecti.  Inquantum  igitur  est  vitalis,  procedit  a  cognoscente; 
implicat  enim  cognoscentem  vivere  per  aliquid,  quod  ab  ipso  non  est,  sed  pure 
illud  recipit  ab  alio  mere  passive  se  habendo  ;  inquantum  vero  cognitio  est  expressio, 
imitatio  et  imago  objecti,  procedit  ab  objecto " — SILVESTER  MAURUS,  Quaest. 
Philos.,  q.  2.  This  is  the  common  scholastic  distinction  :  cognition  as  a  product  re- 
presentative or  expressive  of  reality  is  a  product  determined  by  the  influence  of 
reality  (as  active)  on  the  mind  (as  passive) ;  cognition  as  a  vital  process  is  active,  a 
reaction  of  mind  to  the  influence  of  reality.  It  may  be  remarked,  however,  that 
the  cognitive  process,  as  vital,  has  always  a  positive  term.  Our  cognitive  pro- 
cesses are  partly  at  least  processes  of  abstracting,  comparing,  relating,  universa- 
lizing: processes  which  produce  "  intentiones  logicas"  or  "  eniia  rationis"  such 
as  the  "  intentio  universalitatis"  the  relation  of  subject  to  predicate,  and  other 
logical  relations  and  logical  distinctions :  and  hence  arises  the  difficulty,  when  we 
come  to  reflect  on  our  cognitive  experience,  of  discriminating  between  these 
"  logical  entities'"  and  the  reality  which  we  interpret  by  means  of  them :  of 
discriminating,  in  other  words,  between  logical  and  real  distinctions. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  145 

or  constructive  influence  than  would  be  allowed  to  it  by  advocates  of  the 
reality  of  such  distinctions.  But  by  doing  so  are  they  to  be  regarded  as  call- 
ing into  question  the  objective  validity  of  human  knowledge  ?  By  no  means  : 
the  fact  that  the  human  mind  can  understand  reality  only  by  processes  of 
abstracting,  generalizing,  comparing,  relating,  analysing  and  synthesizing — 
processes  which  involve  the  production  of  logical  entities — in  no  way  vitiates 
the  value  of  these  modes  of  understanding  :  it  merely  indicates  that  they  are 
less  perfect  ithan  intuitive  modes  of  understanding  which  would  dispense 
with  such  logical  entities, — the  modes  characteristic  of  pure,  angelic  in- 
telligences, or  the  knowledge  of  the  Diety.  The  objective  validity  of 
human  cognition  is  not  interfered  with  either  by  enlarging  or  by  restricting  the 
domain  of  the  mind's  constitutive  activity  in  forming  such  logical  entities  ; 
nor,  therefore,  by  claiming  that  certain  distinctions  are  real  rather  than 
virtual,  or  vice  versa.  It  must  be  remembered,  moreover,  that  the  virtual 
distinction  is  not  purely  logical :  it  has  a  foundation  in  the  reality,  a  "funda- 
mentum  in  re  "/  and  in  so  far  as  it  has  it  gives  us  an  insight  into  the  nature 
of  reality. 

No  doubt,  any  particular  distinction  cannot  be  virtual  and  at  the  same 
time  simply  real :  either  view  of  it  must  be  erroneous  :  and  possibly  both,  if 
it  happen  to  be  de  facto  a  purely  logical  distinction.  But  the  error  of  con- 
founding a  virtual  distinction  with  a  real  is  not  so  great  as  that  of  regarding 
either  as  a  purely  logical  distinction.  Now  the  tendency  of  much  modern 
philosophy,  under  the  influence  of  Kant,  has  been  to  regard  all  the  categories 
in  which  the  mind  apprehends  reality  as  being  wholly  and  exclusively 
forms  of  cognition,  as  being  in  the  reality  neither  formally  nor  even  funda- 
mentally ;  and  to  infer  from  this  an  essential,  constitutional  inability  of  the 
mind  to  attain  to  a  valid  knowledge  of  reality.  But  if,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
these  categories  are  in  the  reality  formally,  nay,  even  if  they  are  in  it  only 
fundamentally,  the  inference  that  issues  in  Kantian  subjectivism  is  unwar- 
ranted. And  those  categories  we  hold  to  be  in  the  reality  at  least  funda- 
mentally ;  we  therefore  reject  the  Kantian  phenomenism  of  the  speculative 
reason.  Moreover,  we  can  see  no  valid  ground  for  admitting  the  Kantian 
division  of  the  human  mind  into  two  totally  separate  cognitive  compartments, 
the  speculative  and  the  practical  reason,  and  ascribing  to  each  compartment 
cognitive  principles  and  capacities  entirely  alien  to  the  other.  To  arrive  at  a 
right  theory  of  knowledge  human  cognitive  experience  as  a  whole  must  be 
analysed  ;  but  provided  the  analysis  is  really  an  analysis  of  this  experience 
it  may  be  legitimately  directed  towards  discovering  what  the  mental  conditions 
must  be — i.e.  the  conditions  on  the  side  of  the  knowing  subject,  the  subject 
having  the  experience — which  are  necessarily  prerequisite  for  having  such 
experience.  And  if  it  be  found  by  such  analysis  that  cognitive  experience 
presupposes  in  the  knowing  subject  not  merely  a  sentient  and  intelligent  mind, 
but  a  mind  which  perceives,  imagines,  remembers  reality  in  certain  definite 
ways  ;  which  thinks  reality  in  certain  modes  and  through  certain  forms  which 
by  its  own  constitutive  activity  it  constructs  for  itself,  and  which  it  recognizes 
by  reflection  to  be  its  own  constructions  (e.g.  distinctions,  relations,  affirma- 
tions and  negations,  abstractions,  generalizations,  etc.  :  intentiones  logicae, 
logical  entities),— there  is  no  reason  whatever  in  all  this  for  inferring  that  be- 
cause the  mind  is  so  constituted,  because  it  has  these  modes  of  cognition,  it 

10 


I46  ONTOLOGY 

must  necessarily  fail  to  reach,  by  means  of  them,  a  true,  valid,  and  genuine 
knowledge  of  reality.  From  the  fact  that  human  modes  of  cognition  are 
human,  and  not  angelic  or  divine  ;  from  the  fact  that  reality  can  be  known 
to  man  only  through  these  modes,  these  finite  modes  of  finite  human  faculties, — 
we  may  indeed  infer  that  even  our  highest  knowledge  of  reality  is  inadequate, 
that  it  does  not  comprehend 'all  that  is  in  the  reality,  but  surely  not  that  it  is 
essentially  illusory  and  of  its  very  nature  incapable  of  giving  us  any  true  and 
valid  insight  into  the  nature  of  reality. 

Fixing  our  attention  on  the  virtual  distinction  we  see  that  the 
mind  is  supposed  by  means  of  it  to  apprehend,  through  a  plurality 
of  distinct  concepts,  what  it  knows  somehow  or  other  to  be  one 
being.  Now  if  it  knows  the  reality  to  be  really  one,  it  knows 
that  the  formal  object  of  every  distinct  concept  of  this  reality  is 
really  identical  with  the  objects  of  all  the  other  concepts  of  the 
latter.  This  condition  of  things  is  certainly  verified  when  the 
mind  can  see  that  each  of  the  distinct  concepts,  though  not 
explicitly  presenting  the  objects  of  the  others,  nevertheless  im- 
plicitly and  necessarily  involves  all  these  other  objects : J  for  by 
seeing  that  the  distinct  concepts  necessarily  involve  one  another 
objectively  it  isees  that  the  reality  apprehended  through  all  of 
them  must  necessarily  be  one  reality.  This  is  what  takes  place 
in  the  imperfect  virtual  distinction :  the  concepts  prescind  from 
one  another  formally,  not  objectively.  But  suppose  that  the 
distinct  concepts  prescind  from  one  another  objectively,  so  that 
they  cannot  be  seen  by  any  analysis  to  involve  one  another  even 

1  It  is  not  necessary  of  course  that  this  implicit  embodiment  of  all  the  others, 
by  any  one  of  them,  be  seen  to  be  mutual.  It  is  sufficient,  for  instance,  that  of  the 
concepts  a,  b,  c  and  d,  a  be  seen  implicitly  to  involve  b,  b  to  involve  ct  etc.,  though 
not  vice  versa.  However,  it  must  be  remarked  that  in  the  exercise  of  thought  upon 
its  abstract  objects  we  feel  something  wanting  to  our  intellectual  insight  as  long  as 
the  relations  we  apprehend  are  not  reciprocal.  In  the  sciences  of  abstract  quantity 
we  approximate  to  the  ideal  of  establishing  reciprocal  relations  throughout  the 
whole  system  of  the  concepts  analysed.  But  abstract  thought  does  not  give  us  an 
adequate  apprehension  of  the  real :  it  represents  reality  only  under  the  static  aspect, 
and  as  abstract,  i.e.  apart  from  the  individualizing  conditions  of  time  and  space 
which  affect  its  concrete,  actual  existence  as  revealed  in  sense  experience.  Were  we 
to  neglect  the  latter,  and  consider  merely  what  abstract  thought  gives  us,  we  should 
regard  as  really  one  what  is  one  for  thought.  But  what  is  one  for  thought  is  the 
universal ;  and  the  logical  issue  of  holding  the  universal  as  such  to  be  real  is  monism. 
Or  again,  to  put  the  matter  in  another  way,  in  so  far  as  intellect  sees  the  objects  of  its 
various  abstract  concepts  to  involve  one  another  necessarily,  it  has  no  reason — as 
long  as  it  ignores  the  verdict  of  sense  experience  on  the  real  manifoldness  of  actually 
existing  being — to  abstain  from  attributing  a  real  unity  to  the  whole  system  of 
abstract  thought-objects  which  it  contemplates  as  reciprocally  and  necessarily  inter- 
related. On  the  contrary,  it  should  pronounce  that  whatever  plurality  can  be  unified 
by  the  dialectically  necessary  relations  discovered  by  thought,  is  really  one,  and 
must  be  regarded  as  one  reality  :  which,  again,  is  monism.  But  a  philosophy  which 
thus  ignores  sense  experience  must  be  one-sided  and  misleading. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  147 

implicitly,  but  present  to  the  mind,  so  far  as  they  themselves  are 
concerned,  adequately  distinct  modes  of  being — as  happens 
in  the  perfect  virtual  distinction,  e.g.  between  organic  life, 
sentient  life,  and  intellectual  life  (in  man),  or  between  animality 
and  rationality  (in  man), — then  the  all-important  question  arises  : 
How  do  we  know,  in  any  given  case  of  this  kind,  whether  or  not 
these  adequately  distinct  thought-objects  are  identical  with  one 
another  in  the  reality  ?  What  is  the  test  for  determining  whether 
or  not,  in  a  given  case,  these  objects,  which  are  many  for  abstract 
intellectual  thought,  are  one  being  in  the  real  order  ?  The  answer 
seems  to  be  that  internal  and  external  sense  experience  can  and 
does  furnish  us  with  embodiments  of  these  intellectual  manifolds, 
—embodiments  each  of  which  we  apprehend  as  a  being  that  is 
really  one,  as  an  individual  subject  of  which  they  are  conceptually 
distinct  predicates. 

It  would  appear,  therefore,  that  we  cannot  reach  a  true  conception  of 
what  we  are  to  regard  as  really  one,  or  really  manifold,  by  abstract  thought 
alone.  It  is  external  and  internal  sense  experience,  not  abstract  thought, 
which  first  brings  us  into  direct  and  immediate  mental  contact  with  actually 
existing  reality.  What  we  have  therefore  to  determine  is  this  :  Does  sense 
experience,  or  does  it  not,  reveal  reality  to  us  as  a  real  manifold,  not  as  one 
being  but  as  beings  coexisting  outside  one  another  in  space,  succeeding  one 
another  in  time,  interdependent  on  one  another,  interacting  on  one  another, 
and  by  this  interaction  causing  and  undergoing  real  change,  each  producing 
others,  or  being  produced  by  others,  really  distinct  from  itself?  In  other 
words,  is  separateness  of  existence  in  time  or  space,  as  revealed  in  sense 
experience,  a  sufficient  index  of  the  real  manifoldness  of  corporeal  being,  and 
of  the  really  distinct  individuality  of  each  such  being  ? — or  are  we  to  take  it 
that  because  those  space  and  time  distinctions  have  to  be  apprehended  by 
thought  in  order  that  not  merely  sense  but  intellect  may  apprehend  corporeal 
beings  as  really  manifold,  therefore  these  distinctions  are  not  in  the  reality 
given  to  us  ?  Or,  again,  is  each  person's  own  conscious  experience  of  himself 
as  one  being,  of  his  own  unity,  and  of  his  distinctness  from  other  persons,  a 
sufficient  index  that  the  distinction  between  person  and  person  is  a  real  dis- 
tinction ? — or  are  we  to  take  it  that  because  \i\sfeeling  of  his  individual  unity 
through  sense  consciousness  must  be  interpreted  by  the  thought-concepts  of 
"one"— "individual  "—"person"— "distinct"  from  "others,"  these  con- 
cepts do  not  truly  express  what  is  really  given  him  to  interpret  ?  Finally,  if 
we  can  infer  from  the  actually  existing  material  reality  which  forms  the 
immediate  datum  of  direct  experience,  or  from  the  human  Ego  as  given  in  this 
experience,  the  actual  existence  of  a  real  mode  of  being  which  is  not  material 
but  spiritual,  by  what  tests  can  we  determine  whether  this  spiritual  mode  of 
being  is  really  one,  or  whether  there  is  a  real  plurality  of  such  beings  ?  The 
solution  of  these  questions  bears  directly  on  the  validity  of  the  adequate  or 
"  greater  "  real  distinction,  the  "  distinctio  realis  major  seu  absoluta  ". 

10* 


I48  ONTOLOGY 

The  philosophy  which  defends  the  validity  of  this  distinction, — which 
holds  that  the  distinction  between  individual  human  beings,  and  between 
individual  living  things  generally,  is  in  the  fullest  and  truest  sense  a  real  dis- 
tinction,— is  at  all  events  in  conformity  with  universally  prevailing  modes  of 
thought  and  language  ;  while  the  monism  which  repudiates  these  spontaneous 
interpretations  of  experience  as  invalid  by  denying  all  real  manifoldness  to 
reality,  can  make  itself  intelligible  only  by  doing  violence  to  thought  and 
language  alike.  Not  that  this  alone  is  a  disproof  of  monism  ;  but  at  all 
events  it  creates  a  presumption  against  a  system  to  find  it  running  counter  to 
any  of  those  universal  spontaneous  beliefs  which  appear  to  be  rooted  in  man's 
rational  nature.  On  the  other  hand,  the  philosophy  which  accords  with 
common  belief  in  proclaiming  a  real  plurality  in  being  has  to  reconcile  intellect 
with  sense,  and  the  universal  with  the  individual,  by  solving  the  important 
problem  of  individuation  :  What  is  it  that  makes  real  being  individual,  if, 
notwithstanding  the  fact  that  intellect  apprehends  reality  as  abstract  and 
universal,  reality  nevertheless  can  exist  only  as  concrete  and  individual  ? 
(29-33). 

38.  THE  REAL  DISTINCTION. — In  the  next  place  it  must  be 
remembered,  comparing  the  virtual  distinction  with  the  real, 
that  philosophers  have  recognized  two  kinds  of  real  distinction  : 
the  major  or  absolute  real  distinction,  and  the  minor  real,  or  modal 
distinction.  Before  defining  these  let  us  see  what  are  the  usual 
signs  by  which  a  real  distinction  in  general  can  be  recognized. 

The  relation  of  efficient  causality,  of  efficient  cause  and  effect,  between 
two  objects  of  thought,  is  sometimes  set  down  as  a  sure  sign  of  a  (major)  real 
distinction  between  them.1  And  the  reason  alleged  is  that  a  thing  cannot  be 
the  efficient  cause  of  itself :  the  efficient  cause  is  necessarily  extrinsic  to  the 
effect  and  cannot  be  really  identical  with  the  latter.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  this 
test  applies  to  reality  as  actually  existing,  as  producing  or  undergoing  change, 
and  that  it  is  derived  from  our  sense  experience  of  reality  in  process  of  change. 
But  since  our  concept  of  efficient  causality  has  its  origin  in  our  i internal  ex- 
perience of  our  own  selves  as  active  agents,  as  causing  some  portion  of  what 
enters  into  our  experience,  the  test  seems  to  assume  that  we  have  already 
introduced  into  this  experience  a  real  distinction  between  the  self  and  what  is 
caused  by  the  self.  It  is  not  clear  that  the  relation  of  efficient  cause  to  effect, 
as  applied  to  created  causes,  can  precede  and  reveal,  in  our  experience,  the 
relation  of  what  is  really  one  to  what  is  really  other,  in  this  experience.  If 
the  reality  revealed  to  us  in  our  direct  experience,  the  phenomenal  universe, 
has  been  brought  into  existence  by  the  creative  act  of  a  Supreme  Being,  this, 
of  course,  implies  a  real  distinction  between  Creator  and  creature.  But  it 
does  not  seem  possible  in  this  case,  or  indeed  in  any  case,  to  prove  the  exist- 
ence of  the  causal  relation  antecedently  to  that  of  the  real  distinction,  or  to 
utilize  the  former  as  an  index  to  the  latter. 

Two  distinct  thought-objects  are  regarded  as  really  distinct 
(i)  when  they  are  found  to  exist  separately  and  apart  from  each 

1  Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  Disp.  ii.,  cap.  ii.,  art.  5  (p.  319). 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  149 

other  in  time  or  space,  as  is  the  case  with  any  two  individuals 
such  as  John  and  James,  or  a  man  and  a  horse  ;  (2)  when,  although 
they  are  found  in  the  same  individual,  one  of  them  at  least  is 
separable  from  the  other,  in  the  sense  that  it  can  actually  exist 
without  that  other  :  for  example,  the  soul  of  any  individual  man 
can  exist  apart  from  the  material  principle  with  which  it  is  actu- 
ally united  to  form  this  living  human  individual ;  the  individual 
himself  can  exist  without  the  particular  accidental  modes,  such 
as  sitting,  thinking,  speaking,  which  actually  affect  his  being  at 
any  particular  instant  of  his  existence. 

From  this  we  can  gather  in  the  first  place  that  the  distinction 
between  two  " individuals," — individual  "persons"  or  individual 
"  things  " — is  a  real  distinction  in  the  fullest  and  plainest  sense 
of  this  expression,  a  major  or  absolute  real  distinction.  It  is, 
moreover,  not  merely  real  but  actual.  Two  existing  * '  individuals  " 
are  always  actually  divided  and  separate  from  each  other,  while 
each  is  actually  one  or  actually  undivided  in  itself.  And  they 
are  so  "  independently  of  the  consideration  of  the  mind  ". 

In  the  second  place,  assuming  that  the  mind  can  apprehend, 
in  the  individuals  of  its  experience,  a  unity  resulting  from  the 
union  or  composition  of  separable  factors  or  principles,  whether 
essential  or  accidental  [27(£)J  ;  and  assuming  that  it  can  know 
these  factors  to  be  really  separable  (though  actually  one  and 
undivided),  that  is,  separable  in  the  sense  that  each  of  any  two 
such  factors,  or  at  least  one  of  them,  could  actually  exist  without 
the  other, — it  regards  the  distinction  between  such  factors  as<real. 
They  are  really  distinct  because  though  actually  one  and  un- 
divided they  are  potentially  manifold.  If  each  has  a  positive 
entity  of  its  own,  so  that  absolutely  speaking  each  could  exist 
without  the  other,  the  distinction  is  still  regarded  as  an  absolute 
or  major  real  distinction.  For  example,  the  human  soul  can 
exist  without  the  body  ;  the  body  can  exist  without  the  soul, 
being  actualized  by  the  new  formative  principle  or  principles 
which  replace  the  soul  at  death  ;  therefore  there  is  an  absolute 
real  distinction  between  the  soul  and  the  body  of  the  living 
human  individual :  although  both  factors  form  one  actual  being, 
still,  independently  of  the  consideration  of  the  mind  the  one 
factor  is  not  the  other :  each  is  really,  though  only  potentially, 
other  than  the  factor  with  which  it  is  united :  the  relation  of 
"  one  "  to  "  other  "  though  not  actually  verified  of  either  factor 
(since  there  is  only  one  actual  being  :  the  existing  individual 


ISO  ONTOLOGY 

man),  Is  potentially  and  really  verified,  i.e.  verifiable  of  each. 
Again,  the  individual  corporeal  substance  can,  absolutely  speaking, 
exist  without  its  connatural  accident  of  external  or  local  exten- 
sion ;  this  latter  can,  absolutely  speaking,  exist  without  its  con- 
natural substance  ; *  therefore  these  are  absolutely  and  really 
distinct. 

If  only  one  of  the  factors  is  seen  to  be  capable  of  existing 
without  the  other,  and  the  latter  to  be  such  that  it  could  not 
actually  exist  except  as  united  with  the  former,  so  that  the 
separability  is  not  mutual,  the  distinction  is  regarded  still  as  real, 
but  only  as  a  minor  or  modal  distinction.  Such,  for  instance,  is 
the  distinction  between  a  body  and  its  location,  or  its  state  of 
rest  or  motion :  and,  in  general,  the  distinction  between  a  sub- 
stance and  what  are  called  its  accidental  modes  or  modal  acci- 
dents. The  distinction  is  regarded  as  real  because  reflection  is 
held  to  assure  us  that  it  is  in  the  reality  itself  independently  of 
the  mind,  and  not  merely  imposed  by  the  mind  on  the  reality 
because  of  some  ground  or  reason  in  the  reality.  It  is  called  a 
modal  distinction  rather  than  an  absolute  real  distinction  because 
those  accidental  modes  of  a  substance  do  not  seem  to  have  of 
themselves  sufficient  reality  to  warrant  our  calling  them  "things  " 
or  "realities,"  but  rather  merely  "modes  "  or  "  determinations" 
of  things  or  realities.  It  is  significant,  as  throwing  light  on  the 
relation  of  the  virtual  to  the  real  distinction,  that  some  authors 
call  the  modal  distinction  not  a  real  distinction  but  a  "  distinctio 
media, "  i.e.  intermediate  between  a  real  and  a  logical  distinction ; 
and  that  the  question  whether  it  should  be  called  simply  a  real 
distinction,  or  "  intermediate  "  between  a  real  and  a  logical  dis- 
tinction is  regarded  by  some  as  "a  purely  verbal  question" 
We  shall  recur  to  the  modal  distinction  later  (68). 

In  the  third  place  it  must  be  noted  that  separability  in  the 
sense  explained,  even  non-mutual,  is  not  regarded  as  the  only 
index  to  a  real  distinction.  In  other  words,  certain  distinctions 
are  held  by  some  to  be  real  even  though  this  test  of  separability 
does  not  apply.  For  instance,  it  is  commonly  held  that  not 
merely  in  man  but  in  all  corporeal  individuals  the  formative  and 
the  determinable  principle  of  the  nature  or  substance,  the  forma 
substantiate  and  the  materia  prima,  are  really  distinct,  although 
it  is  admitted  that,  apart  from  the  case  of  the  human  soul,  neither 
can  actually  exist  except  in  union  with  the  other.  What  is  held 

1  Cf.  infra,  §  83.  3  Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.t  ibid.  p.  322, 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  151 

in  regard  to  accidental  modes  is  also  applied  to  these  essential 
principles  of  the  corporeal  substance :  viz.  that  there  is  here  a 
special  reason  why  such  principles  cannot  actually  exist  in  isola- 
tion. Of  their  very  nature  they  are  held  to  be  such  that  they 
cannot  be  actualized  or  actually  exist  in  isolation,  but  only  in 
union.  But  this  fact,  it  is  contended,  does  not  prove  that  the 
principles  in  question  are  merely  mentally  distinct  aspects  of  one 
reality :  the  fact  that  they  cannot  actually  exist  as  such  sepa- 
rately does  not  prove  that  they  are  not  really  separable  ;  and  it 
is  contended  that  they  are  really  and  actually  separated  whenever 
an  individual  corporeal  substance  undergoes  substantial  change. 

This,  then,  raises  once  more  the  question  :  What  sort  of  "  separation  " 
or  "separability  "  is  the  test  of  a  real  distinction  ?  Is  it  separateness  in  and 
for  sense  perception,  or  separateness  in  and  for  intellectual  thought  ?  The 
former  is  certainly  the  fundamental  index  of  the  real  distinction  ;  for  all  our 
knowledge  of  reality  originates  in  sense  experience,  and  separateness  in  time 
and  space,  which  marks  its  data,  is  the  key  to  our  knowledge  of  reality  as  a 
manifold  of  really  distinct  individual  beings  ;  and  when  we  infer  from  sense- 
experience  the  actual  existence  of  a  spiritual  domain  of  reality  we  can  con- 
ceive its  "  individuals  "  only  after  the  analogy  of  the  corporeal  individuals  of 
our  immediate  sense  experience.  Scholastic  philosophers,  following  Aristotle, 
have  always  taken  the  manifoldness  of  reality,  i.e.  its  presentation  in  sense 
experience  in  the  form  of  "individuals,"  of  "this"  and  "that,"  "roSert," 
"  hoc  aliquid"  as  an  unquestioned  and  unquestionable  real  datum.  Not  that 
they  naively  assumed  everything  perceived  by  the  senses  as  an  individual,  in 
time  and  space,  to  be  really  an  individual :  they  realized  that  what  is  per- 
ceived by  sense  as  one  limited  continuum,  occupying  a  definite  portion  of 
space,  may  be  in  reality  an  aggregate  of  many  individuals  ;  and  they  recog- 
nized the  need  of  scrutinizing  and  analysing  those  apparent  individuals  in 
order  to  test  their  real  individuality  ;  but  they  held,  and  rightly,  that  sense 
experience  does  present  to  us  some  data  that  are  unmistakably  real  indi- 
viduals— individual  men,  for  instance.  Next,  they  saw  that  intellectual 
thought,  by  analysing  sense  experience,  amasses  an  ever-growing  multitude 
of  abstract  and  conceptually  distinct  thought-objects,  which  it  utilizes  as 
predicates  for  the  interpretation  of  this  sense  experience.  These  thought- 
objects  intellect  can  unite  or  separate  ;  can  in  some  cases  positively  see  to  be 
mutually  compatible  or  incompatible ;  can  form  into  ideal  or  possible  com- 
plexes. But  whether  or  not  the  conceptually  distinct,  though  mutually  com- 
patible, thought-objects  forming  any  such  complex,  will  be  also  really  distinct 
from  one  another,  is  a  question  which  evidently  cannot  arise  until  such  a 
complex  is  considered  as  an  actual  or  possible  individual  being :  for  it  is 
the  individual  only  that  exists  or  can  exist.  They  will  be  really  distinct  when 
found  actualized  in  distinct  individuals.  Even  the  conceptually  one  and 
self-identical  abstract  thought-object  will  be  really  distinct  from  itself  when 
embodied  in  distinct  individuals ;  the  one  single  abstract  thought-object, 
"  humanity,"  "  human  nature,"  is  really  distinct  from  itself  in  John  and  in 
James  ;  the  humanity  of  John  is  really  other than  the  humanity  of  James. 


152  ONTOLOGY 

Of  course,  if  conceptually  distinct  thought-objects  are  seen  to  be  mutually 
incompatible  they  cannot  be  found  realized  except  in  really  distinct  individuals  : 
the  union  of  them  is  only  an  ens  rationis.  Again  it  may  be  that  the  intellect 
is  unable  to  pronounce  positively  as  to  whether  they  are  compatible  or  not 
(18) :  as  to  whether  the  complex  forms  a  possible  being  or  not.  But  when 
the  intellect  positively  sees  such  thought -objects  to  be  mutually  compatible — 
by  interpretation  of,  and  inference  from,  its  actual  sense  experience  of  them 
as  embodied  in  individuals  (18) — and  when,  furthermore,  it  now  finds  a  number 
of  them  co-existing  in  some  one  actual  individual,  the  question  recurs  :  How 
can  it  know  whether  they  are  really  distinct  from  each  other,  though  actually 
united  to  form  one  (essentially  or  accidentally  composite)  individual,  or  only 
conceptually  distinct  aspects  of  one  (simple)  individual  [27  (£)]  ? 

This,  as  we  have  seen  already,  is  the  case  for  which  it  is  really  difficult  to 
find  a  satisfactory  test :  and  hence  the  different  views  to  be  found  among 
scholastic  philosophers  as  to  the  nature  of  the  distinctions  which  the  mind 
makes  or  discovers  within  the  individual.  The  difficulty  is  this.  The  con- 
ceptual distinctions  between  compatible  thought-objects  is  not  a  proof  of  real 
distinction  when  these  thought-objects  are  found  united  in  one  individual  of 
sense  experience,  as  e.g.  animality  and  rationality  in  man  ;  and  the  only  dis- 
tinction given  to  us  by  sense  experience,  at  least  directly  and  immediately,  as 
undoubtedly  real,  is  the  distinction  between  corporeal  individuals  existing 
apart  in  space  or  time,  as  e.g.  between  man  and  man.  How  then,  can  we 
show  that  any  distinctions  within  the  individual  are  real  ? 

Well,  we  have  seen  that  certain  entities,  which  are  objects  of  sense  or  of 
thought,  or  of  both,  can  disappear  from  the  individual  without  the  residue 
thereby  perishing  or  ceasing  to  exist  actually  as  an  individual :  the  human 
soul  survives,  as  an  actual  individual  reality,  after  its  separation  from  the 
material  principle  with  which  it  formed  the  individual  man  ;  the  individual 
man  persists  while  the  accidental  modes  that  affect  him  disappear.  In  such 
cases  as  these,  intellect,  interpreting  sense  experience  and  reasoning  from  it, 
places  a  real  distinction,  in  the  composite  individual,  between  the  factors  that 
can  continue  to  exist  without  others,  and  these  latter.  In  doing  so  it  is  appar- 
ently applying  the  analogy  of  the  typical  real  distinction — that  between  one 
individual  and  another.  The  factor,  or  group  of  factors,  which  can  continue 
to  exist  actually  after  the  separation  of  the  others,  is  an  individual :  and  what 
were  separated  from  it  were  apparently  real  entities,  though  they  may  have 
perished  by  the  actual  separation.  But  on  what  ground  is  the  distinction  be- 
tween the  material  principle  and  the  vital  principle  of  a  plant  or  an  animal, 
for  example,  regarded  as  real  ?  Again  on  the  ground  furnished  by  the  anal- 
ogy of  the  distinction  between  individuals  of  sense  experience.  Note  that  it 
is  not  between  the  material  and  the  vital  principles  as  objects  of  abstract 
thought,  i.e.  between  the  materiality  and  the  vitality  of  the  plant  or  the 
animal,  that  a  real  distinction  is  claimed  :  these  are  regarded  only  as  con- 
ceptually distinct  aspects  of  the  plant  or  the  animal ;  nor  is  it  admitted  that 
because  one  of  these  thought-objects  is  found  embodied  elsewhere  in  nature 
without  the  other — materiality  without  vitality  in  the  inorganic  universe — we 
can  therefore  conclude  that  they  are  really  distinct  in  the  plant  or  the  animal. 
No  ;  it  is  between  the  two  principles  conceived  as  coexisting  and  united  in  the 
concrete  individual  that  the  real  distinction  is  claimed.  And  it  is  held  to  be 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  153 

a  real  distinction  because  substantial  change  in  corporeal  things,  i.e.  corrup- 
tion and  generation  of  individual  corporeal  substances,  is  held  to  be  real. 
If  it  is  real  there  is  a  real  separation  of  essential  factors  when  the  individual 
perishes.  And  the  factors  continue  to  be  real,  as  potential  principles  of  other 
individuals,  when  any  individual  corporeal  substance  perishes.  Each  principle 
may  not  continue  to  exist  actually  as  such  in  isolation  from  the  other — though 
some  scholastics  hold  that,  absolutely  speaking,  they  could  be  conserved 
apart,  as  actual  entities,  by  the  Author  of  Nature.  But  they  can  actually  exist 
as  essential  principles  of  other  actual  individuals  :  they  are  real  potenti- 
alities, which  become  actual  in  other  individuals.  Thus  we  see  that  they  are 
conceived  throughout  after  the  analogy  of  the  individual.  Those  who  hold 
that,  absolutely  speaking,  the  material  principle  as  such,  materia  prima,  could 
actually  exist  in  isolation  from  any  formative  principle,  should  apparently 
admit  that  in  such  a  case  it  would  be  an  individual  reality. 

39.  SOME  QUESTIONABLE  DISTINCTIONS.  THE  SCOTIST 
DISTINCTION. — The  difficulty  of  discriminating  between  the 
virtual  and  the  real  distinction  in  an  individual  has  given  rise  to 
the  conception  of  distinctions  which  some  maintain  to  be  real, 
others  to  be  less  than  real.  The  virtual  distinction,  as  we  have 
hitherto  understood  it,  may  be  described  as  extrinsic  inasmuch  as 
it  arises  in  the  individual  only  when  we  consider  the  latter  under 
different  aspects,  or  in  different  relations  to  things  extrinsic  to  it. 
By  regarding  an  individual  under  different  aspects — e.g.  a  man 
under  the  aspects  of  animality  and  rationality — we  can  predicate 
contradictory  attributes  of  the  individual,  e.g.  of  a  man  that  "  he 
is  similar  to  a  horse,"  and  that  "  he  is  not  similar  to  a  horse ". 
Now  it  is  maintained  by  some  that  although  independently  of 
the  consideration  of  the  mind  the  grounds  of  these  contradictory 
predications  are  not  actually  distinct  in  the  individual,  neverthe- 
less even  before  such  consideration  the  individual  has  a  real 
intrinsic  capacity  to  have  these  contradictory  predicates  affirmed 
of  him :  they  can  be  affirmed  of  him  not  merely  when  he  is 
regarded,  and  because  he  is  regarded,  under  conceptually  different 
aspects,  but  because  these  principles,  "  animality  "  and  "  ration- 
ality," are  already  really  in  him  not  merely  as  aspects  but  as 
distinct  capacities,  as  potentially  distinct  principles  of  contra- 
dictory predications. 

The  virtual  distinction,  understood  in  this  way,  is  described 
as  intrinsic.  It  is  rejected  by  some  on  the  ground  that,  at  least 
in  its  application  to  finite  realities,  it  involves  a  violation  of  the 
principle  of  contradiction  :  it  seems  to  imply  that  one  and  the 
same  individual  has  in  itself  absolutely  (and  not  merely  as  con- 


154  ONTOLOGY 

sidered  under  different  aspects  and  relations)  the  capacity  to 
verify  of  itself  contradictory  predicates. 

Scotus  and  his  followers  go  even  farther  than  the  advocates 
of  this  intrinsic  virtual  distinction  by  maintaining  the  existence 
of  a  distinction  which  on  the  one  hand  they  hold  to  be  less  than 
real  because  it  is  not  between  "  thing  and  thing,"  and  on  the 
other  hand  to  be  more  than  logical  or  virtual,  because  it  actually 
exists  between  the  various  thought-objects  or  "formalitates" 
(such,  e.g.  as  animality  and  rationality)  in  the  individual,  inde- 
pendently of  the  analytic  activity  whereby  the  mind  detects 
these  in  the  latter.  This  distinction  Scotists  call  a  "formal 
distinction,  actual  on  the  part  of  the  thing  " — "  distinctioformalis, 
actuates  ex  natura  ra."  Hence  the  name  "  formalists  "  applied 
to  Scotists,  from  their  advocacy  of  this  "  Scotistic  "  distinction. 
It  is,  they  explain,  a  distinction  not  between  "things"  ("res") 
but  between  "  formalities  "  (^  formalitates  ").  By  "  thing  "  as  op- 
posed to  "  formality  "  they  mean  not  merely  the  individual,  but 
also  any  positive  thought-object  which,  though  it  may  not  be  cap- 
able of  existing  apart,  can  really  appear  in,  or  disappear  from,  a 
thing  which  can  so  exist:  for  instance,  the  essential  factors  of 
a  really  composite  essence,  its  accidental  modes,  and  its  real 
relations.  By  "  formality  "  they  mean  a  positive  thought-object 
which  is  absolutely  inseparable  from  the  thing  in  which  it  is 
apprehended,  which  cannot  exist  without  the  thing,  nor  the 
thing  without  it :  for  instance,  all  the  metaphysical  grades 
of  being  in  an  individual,  such  as  substantiality,  corporeity, 
life,  animality,  rationality,  individuality,  in  an  individual  man. 
The  distinction  is  called  "  formal "  because  it  is  between  such 
"formalities" — each  of  which  is  the  positive  term  of  a  separate 
concept  of  the  individual.  It  is  called  "  actual  on  the  side  of 
the  thing  "  because  it  is  claimed  to  be  actually  in  the  latter  apart 
from  our  mental  apprehension  of  the  individual.  What  has 
chiefly  influenced  Scotists  in  claiming  this  distinction  to  be  thus 
actually  in  the  individual,  independently  of  our  mental  activity, 
is  the  consideration  that  these  metaphysical  grades  are  grounds 
on  which  we  can  predicate  contradictory  attributes  of  the  same 
individual,  e.g.  of  an  individual  man  that  "  he  is  similar  to  a 
horse"  and  that  "he  is  not  similar  to  a  horse":  whence  they 
infer  that  in  order  to  avoid  violation  of  the  principle  of  contra- 
diction, we  must  suppose  these  grounds  to  be  actually  distinct 
in  the  thing. 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  155 

To  this  it  is  replied,  firstly,  that  if  such  predications  were 
truly  contradictory  we  could  avoid  violation  of  the  principle  of 
contradiction  only  by  inferring  a  real  distinction — which  Scotists 
deny  to  exist — between  these  grounds ;  secondly,  that  such  pre- 
dications are  not  truly  contradictory  inasmuch  as  "he  is  similar" 
really  means  "  he  is  partially  similar,"  and  "he  is  not  similar" 
means  "  he  is  not  completely  similar " :  therefore  when  we 
say  that  a  man's  rationality  "is  not  the  principle  whereby  he 
resembles  a  horse,"  and  his  animality  "ts  the  principle  whereby 
he  resembles  a  horse,"  we  mean  (a)  that  his  rationality  is 
not  the  principle  of  complete  resemblance,  though  we  know 
it  is  the  principle  of  partial  resemblance,  inasmuch  as  we  see 
it  to  be  really  identical  with  that  which  is  the  principle  of 
partial  resemblance,  viz.  his  animality ;  and  we  mean  (b)  that  his 
animality  is  the  principle  of  his  partial  resemblance  to  a  horse, 
not  of  total  resemblance,  for  we  know  that  the  animality  of  a  man 
is  not  perfectly  similar  to  that  of  a  horse,  the  former  being  really 
identical  with  rationality,  the  latter  with  irrationality.  When, 
then,  we  predicate  of  one  thing  that  "  it  is  similar  to  some  other 
thing,"  and  that  "  it  is  not  similar  to  this  other  thing  "  we  are  not 
really  predicating  contradictories  of  the  same  thing ;  if  we  take 
the  predicates  as  contradictories  they  are  true  of  the  same  reality 
undoubtedly,  but  not  under  the  same  aspect.  Scotists  themselves 
admit  that  the  real  identity  of  these  aspects  involves  no  violation 
of  the  principle  of  contradiction  ;  why,  then,  should  these  be  held 
to  be  actually  distinct  formalities  independently  of  the  considera- 
tion of  the  mind  ?  How  can  a  distinction  that  is  actual  inde- 
pendently of  the  mind's  analysis  of  the  reality  be  other  than 
real?  Is  not  predication  a  work  of  the  mind?  And  must  not 
the  conditions  on  which  reality  verifies  the  predication  be  deter- 
mined by  the  mind?  If,  then,  we  see  that  in  order  to  justify  this 
predication — of  "  similar  "  and  "  not  similar  " — about  any  reality, 
it  is  merely  necessary  that  the  mind  should  apprehend  this  reality 
to  be  in  its  undivided  unity  equivalent  to  manifold  grades  of  being 
or  perfection  which  the  mind  itself  can  grasp  as  mentally  distinct 
aspects,  by  distinct  concepts,  how  can  we  be  justified  in  sup- 
posing that  these  grades  of  being  are  not  merely  distinguishable, 
but  actually  distinct  in  the  reality  itself,  independently  of  the  mind? 

The  Scotist  doctrine  here  is  indicative  of  the  tendency  to  emphasize,  per- 
haps unduly,  the  assimilation  of  reality  as  a  datum  with  the  mind  which 
interprets  this  datum  ;  to  regard  the  constitution  of  reality  itself  as  being  what 


I56  ONTOLOGY 

abstract  thought,  irrespective  of  sense  experience,  would  represent  it ;  and 
accordingly  to  place  in  the  reality  as  being  actually  there,  independently  of 
thought,  distinctions  which  as  a  matter  of  fact  may  be  merely  the  product  of 
thought  itself. 

Scotists,  by  advocating  an  actual  distinction  between  these  grades  of 
being,  as  "formalities"  in  the  individual,  have  exposed  themselves  to  the 
charge  of  extreme  realism.  They  teach  that  each  of  these  "  formalities  "  has, 
for  abstract  thought,  a  formal  unity  which  is  sui  generis.  And  this  unity  is 
not  regarded  as  a  product  of  thought,  any  more  than  the  distinction  between 
such  unities.  Thus,  the  materiality  apprehended  by  thought  in  all  material 
things  is  one,  not  because  it  is  made  one  by  the  abstracting  and  univer- 
salizing activity  of  thought,  as  most  if  not  all  other  scholastics  teach  ;  it  is 
not  merely  conceptually  one  through  our  thought-activity,  it  is  formally  one 
apart  from  the  latter ;  and  it  thus  knits  into  a  "  formal "  unity  all  material 
things.  And  so  does  "  life  "  all  living  things  ;  and  "  animality  "  all  animals  ; 
and  "  rationality  "  all  men.  Now,  if  this  "  formal  unity  "  of  any  such  essential 
or  metaphysical  grade  of  being  were  regarded  as  a  real  unity,  monism  would 
be  of  course  the  logically  inevitable  corollary  of  the  theory. 

But  the  "  formal  "  unity  of  any  such  essential  grade  of  being  Scotists  will 
not  admit  to  be  a  real  unity,  though  they  hold  it  to  be  characteristic  of  reality 
independently  of  our  thought.  They  contend  that  this  unity  is  quite  compatible 
with  the  real  plurality  conferred  upon  being  by  the  principles  which  individ- 
uate the  latter  ;  and  thus  they  cannot  be  fairly  accused  of  monism.  Their 
reasoning  here  is  characteristically  subtle.  Just  as  any  metaphysical  grade  of 
being,  considered  as  an  object  of  thought,  is  in  itself  neither  manifold  individu- 
ally nor  one  universally — so  that,  as  Thomists  say,  designating  it  in  this  con- 
dition as  the  universale  directum^  or  metaphysicum^  or fundamental 'e,  or  quoad 
rem  conceptam,  we  can  truly  affirm  of  it  in  this  condition  neither  that  it  is  one 
(logically,  as  a  universal)  nor  that  it  is  manifold  (really,  as  multiplied  in  actual 
individuals),1 — so  likewise,  Scotists  contend,  it  is  in  this  condition  ontologically^ 
as  an  entity  in  the  real  order  independently  of  thought,  and  as  such  has  a 
unity  of  its  own,  a  formal  unity,  which,  while  uniting  in  a  formal  unity  all  the 
individuals  that  embody  it,  is  itself  incapable  of  fitting  this  grade  of  being  for 
actual  existence,  and  therefore  admits  those  ultimate  individuating  principles 
which  make  it  a  real  manifold  in  the  actual  order.2 

Thus,  the  metaphysical  grade  of  being,  which,  as  considered  in  itself, 

1  ST.  THOMAS,  De  Ente  et  Essentia,  cap.  iv. :  "  Ideo,  si  quaeratur  utrum  ista  natura 
possit  dici  una  vel  plures,  neutrum  concedendum  est :  quia  utrumque  est  extra  in- 
tellectum  [conceptum]  humanitatis,  et  utrumque   potest  sibi   accidere.     Si  enim 
pluralitas  esset  de  ratione  ejus,  nunquam  posset  esse  una :  cum  tamen  una  sit 
secundum  quod  est  in  Sorte.     Similiter  si  unitas  esset  de  intellectu  et  ratione  ejus, 
tune  esset  una  et  eadem  natura  Sortis  et  Platonis,  nee  posset  in  pluribus  plurificari." 
Cf.  ZIGLIARA,  Summa  Philos.,  Ontologia  (i),  iv.,  v. ;  (3)  iv. 

2  "  Licet  enim  (natura)  nunquam  sit  sine  aliquo  istorum,  non  tamen  est  de  se 
aliquod  istorum,  ita  etiam  in  rerum  natura  secundum  illam  entitatem  habet  verum 
"  esse "    extra    animam    reale :    et    secundum    illam    entitatem   habet    unitatem 
sibi    proportionabilem,    quae    est    indifferens    ad    singularitatem,    ita    quod    non 
repugnat    illi   unitati   de   se,   quod   cum   quacumque   unitate   singularitatis  pona- 
tur." — SCOTUS,  In  L.  Sent.,  2,  dist.  iii.,  q.  7. — Cf.  DE  WULF,  History  of  Medieval 
Philosophy,  p.  372, 


REALITY  AS  ONE  AND  MANIFOLD  157 

Thomists  hold  to  be  an  abstraction,  having  no  other  unity  than  that  which 
thought  confers  upon  it  by  making  it  logically  universal,  Scotists  on  the  con- 
trary hold  to  be  as  such  something  positive  in  the  ontological  order,  having 
there  a  "  formal  "  unity  corresponding  to  the  "  conceptual  "  or  "  logical  "  unity 
which  thought  confers  upon  it  by  universalizing  it.  The  metaphysical  grade 
of  being,  thus  conceived  as  something  positive  in  the  real  order,  Scotists  will 
not  admit  to  be  a  "reality,"  nor  the  unity  which  characterizes  it  a  "real" 
unity.  But  after  all,  if  such  a  "  formality  "  with  its  proportionate  "  unity,"  is 
independent  of  thought ;  and  if  on  the  other  hand  "  universality  "  is  the  work 
of  thought,  so  that  the  universal  as  such  cannot  be  real,  it  is  not  easy  to  see 
how  the  Scotist  doctrine  escapes  the  error  of  extreme  realism.  The  meta- 
physical grade  of  being  is  a  "  formality  "  only  because  it  is  made  abstract 
by  thought ;  and  it  has  "  unity  "  only  because  it  is  made  logically  universal 
by  thought ;  therefore  to  contend  that  as  such  it  is  something  positive  in  the 
real  order,  independently  of  thought,  is  to  "  reify  "  the  abstract  and  universal 
as  such  :  which  is  extreme  realism. 


CHAPTER  V. 
REALITY  AND  THE  TRUE. 

40.  ONTOLOGICAL  TRUTH  CONSIDERED  FROM  ANALYSIS 
OF  EXPERIENCE. — We  have  seen  that  when  the  mind  thinks  of 
any  reality  it  apprehends  it  as  "one,"  that  ontological  unity  is  a 
transcendental  attribute  of  being ;  and  this  consideration  led  us 
to  consider  the  manifoldness  and  the  distinctions  which  char- 
acterize the  totality  of  our  experience.  Now  man  himself  is  a 
real  being  surrounded  by  all  the  other  real  beings  that  constitute 
the  universe.  Moreover  he  finds  himself  endowed  with  faculties 
which  bring  him  into  conscious  relations  both  with  himself  and 
with  those  other  beings ;  and  only  by  the  proper  interpretation 
of  these  relations  can  he  understand  aright  his  place  in  the  uni- 
verse. The  first  in  order  of  these  relations  is  that  of  reality  to 
mind  (25).  This  relation  between  mind  and  reality  is  what  we 
understand  by  Truth. 

Now  truth  is  attributed  both  to  knowledge  and  to  things. 
We  say  that  a  person  thinks  or  judges  truly,  that  his  knowledge 
is  true  (or  correct,  or  accurate),  when  things  really  are  as  he  thinks 
or  judges  them  to  be.  The  truth  which  we  thus  ascribe  to  know- 
ledge, to  the  mind  interpreting  reality,  is  logical  truth :  a  rela- 
tion of  concord  or  conformity  of  the  mind  interpreting  reality— 
or,  of  the  mind's  judgment  about  reality — with  the  reality  itself.1 
Logical  truth  is  dealt  with  in  Logic  and  Epistemology.  We  are 
concerned  here  only  with  the  truth  that  is  attributed  to  reality, 
to  things  themselves  :  ontological,  metaphysical,  transcendental 
truth,  as  it  is  called.  There  is  nothing  abstruse  or  far-fetched 
about  the  use  of  the  terms  "true"  and  "truth"  as  equivalent  to 
•real "  and  "  reality  ".  We  speak  of  "  true  "  gold,  a  "  true  "  friend, 
a  "  veritable  "  hero,  etc.  Now  what  do  we  mean  by  thus  ascrib- 
ing truth  to  a  thing?  We  mean  that  it  corresponds  to  a  mental 
type  or  ideal.  We  call  a  liquid  true  wine  or  real  wine,  for 

1C/.  Science  of  Logic.     Moral  truth  or  veracity — the  conformity  of  language 
with  thought — is  treated  in  Ethics. 

158 


REALITY  AND  THE  TRUE 


'59 


instance,  when  it  verifies  in  itself  the  definition  we  have  formed 
of  the  nature  of  wine.  Hence  whenever  we  apply  the  terms 
"true"  or  "  truth"  to  a  thing  .we  shall  find  that  we  are  consider- 
ing that  thing  not  absolutely  and  in  itself  but  in  reference  to  an 
idea  in  our  minds :  we  do  not  say  of  a  thing  simply  that  it  is 
true,  we  say  that  it  is  truly  such  or  such  a  thing,  i.e.  that  it  is 
really  of  a  certain  nature  already  conceived  by  our  minds.  If  the 
appearance  of  the  thing  suggests  comparison  with  some  such 
ideal  type  or  nature,  and  if  the  thing  is  seen  on  examination  not 
really  to  verify  this  nature  in  itself,  we  say  that  it  is  not  really  or 
truly  such  or  such  a  thing  :  e.g.  that  a  certain  liquid  is  not  really 
wine,  or  is  not  true  wine.  When  we  have  no  such  ideal  type  to 
which  to  refer  a  thing,  when  we  do  not  know  its  nature,  cannot 
classify  and  name  it,  we  have  to  suspend  our  judgment  and  say 
that  we  do  not  know  what  the  thing  really  is.  Hence,  for  ex- 
ample, the  new  rays  discovered  by  Rontgen  were  called  provision- 
ally "  X  rays/'  their  real  nature  being  at  first  unknown.  We 
see,  then,  that  real  or  ontological  truth  is  simply  reality  con- 
sidered as  conformable  with  an  ideal  type,  with  an  idea  in  the 
mind. 

Whence  does  the  human  mind  derive  these  ideal  types,  these 
concepts  or  definitions  of  the  nature  of  things  ?  It  derives  them 
from  actually  experienced  reality  by  abstraction,  comparison, 
generalization,  and  reflection  on  the  data  of  its  experience.1 
Hence  it  follows  that  the  ontological  truth  of  things  is  not 
known  by  the  mind  antecedently  to  the  formation  of  the  mental 
type.  It  is,  of  course,  in  the  things  antecedently  to  any  judgment 
we  form  about  the  things  ;  and  the  logical  truth  of  our  judgments 
is  dependent  on  it,  for  logical  truth  is  the  conformity  of  our 
judgments  with  the  real  nature  of  things.  But  antecedently  to 
all  exercise  of  human  thought,  antecedently  to  our  conception  of 
the  nature  of  a  thing,  the  thing  has  not  for  us  formal  or  actual 
ontological  truth  :  it  has  only  fundamental  or  potential  ontological 
truth.  If  in  this  condition  reality  had  actual  ontological  truth 
for  us,  there  would  be  no  ground  for  our  distinguishing  mentally 
between  the  reality  and  the  truth  of  things ;  whereas  the  exist- 
ence of  this  mental  or  logical  distinction  is  undeniable.  The 
concept  of  reality  is  the  concept  of  something  absolute ;  the 
concept  of  ontological  truth  is  the  concept  of  something  relative, 
not  of  an  absolute  but  of  a  relative  property  of  being. 

1  Cf.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  P.  ii.,  §  4,  i. 


I6o  ONTOLOGY 

But  if  for  the  human  mind  the  ontological  truth  of  things  is — at  least 
proximately,  immediately,  and  in  the  first  place — their  conformity  with  the 
abstract  concepts  of  essences  or  natures,  concepts  derived  by  the  mind  from 
an  analysis  of  its  experience,  how  can  this  ontological  truth  be  one  for  all  men, 
or  immutable  and  necessary  ?  For,  since  men  form  different  and  divergent 
and  conflicting  conceptions  as  to  the  natures  of  things,  and  so  have  different 
views  and  standards  of  truth  for  things,  ontological  truth  would  seem,  accord- 
ing to  the  exposition  just  outlined,  to  be  not  one  but  manifold,  not  immutable 
but  variable  :  consequences  which  surely  cannot  be  admitted  ?  The  answer 
to  this  difficulty  will  lead  us  to  a  deeper  and  more  fundamental  conception  of 
what  ontological  truth  really  is. 

First,  then,  we  must  consider  that  all  men  are  endowed  with  the  same 
sort  of  intellect,  an  intellect  capable  of  some  insight  at  least  into  the  nature  of 
things ;  that  therefore  they  abstract  the  same  transcendental  notions  and  the 
same  widest  concepts  from  their  experience  :  transcendental  concepts  of  being, 
unity,  truth,  goodness ;  generic  concepts  of  substance,  matter,  spirit,  cause,  of 
accident,  quantity,  multitude,  number,  identity,  similarity,  distinction,  diversity, 
etc.  They  also  form  the  same  specific  concepts  of  possible  essences. 
Although,  therefore,  they  may  disagree  and  err  in  regard  to  the  application 
of  those  concepts,  especially  of  the  lower,  richer  and  more  complex  specific 
concepts,  to  the  actual  data  of  their  experience,  they  agree  in  the  fact  that 
they  have  those  common  concepts  or  idea-types  of  reality ;  also  in  the  fact 
that  when  they  apply  those  concepts  rightly  (i.e.  by  logically  true  judgments) 
to  the  things  that  make  up  their  experience,  they  have  so  far  grasped  the  real 
natures  of  these  things  ;  and  finally  in  recognizing  that  the  ontological  truth 
of  these  things  lies  in  the  conformity  of  the  latter  with  their  true  and  proper 
mental  types  or  essences.  And  just  as  each  of  these  latter  is  one,  indivisible, 
immutable,  necessary  and  eternal  (14,  1 5),  so  is  the  ontological  truth  of  things, 
whether  possible  or  actual,  one,  indivisible,  immutable,  necessary  and  eternal. 
Of  course,  just  as  the  human  mind  does  not  constitute  but  only  apprehends 
reality,  so  the  human  mind  does  not  constitute  the  ontological  truth  of 
reality,  but  only  apprehends  it.  Every  reality  is  capable  of  producing  in  the 
human  mind  a  more  or  less  adequate  mental  [representation  of  itself :  in  this 
lies  what  we  may  call  the  potential  or  fundamental  ontological  truth  of 
reality.  When  it  does  produce  such  a  mental  concept  of  itself  its  relation  of 
conformity  to  this  concept  is  its  formal  ontological  ttruth.  Of  course  the 
human  mind  may  err  in  applying  to  any  reality  a  wrong  concept ;  when  it 
does  it  has  so  far  failed  to  grasp  the  real  nature  of  the  thing  and  therefore 
the  ontological  truth  which  is  really  identical  with  this  nature.  But  the 
thing  still  has  its  ontological  truth,  independently  of  the  erring  mind ;  not 
only  fundamental  truth,  but  also  possibly  formal  truth  in  so  far  as  it  may  be 
rightly  apprehended,  and  thus  related  to  its  proper  mental  type,  by  other 
human  minds.  Reality  itself,  therefore,  is  not  and  cannot  be  false,  as  we 
shall  see  more  fully  later  ;  error  or  falsity  is  an  accident  only  of  the  mind 
interpreting  reality. 

41.  ONTOLOGICAL  TRUTH  CONSIDERED  SYNTHETICALLY, 
FROM  THE  STANDPOINT  OF  ITS  ULTIMATE  REAL  BASIS. — So  far 
we  have  explained  ontological  truth  as  a  relation  of  reality  to  the 


REALITY  AND  THE  TRUE  161 

human  intelligence ;  but  this  relation  is  not  one  of  dependence. 
The  objective  term  of  the  relation,  the  reality  itself,  is  anterior  to 
the  human  mind,  it  is  not  constituted  by  the  latter.  The  sub- 
jective term,  the  abstract  concept,  is  indeed  as  a  vital  product 
dependent  on  the  mind,  but  as  representative  of  reality  it  is 
determined  only  by  the  latter.  Is  there,  however,  an  Intelligence 
to  which  reality  is  essentially  conformed,  other  than  the  human 
intelligence  ?  Granted  the  actual  existence  of  contingent  realities, 
and  granted  that  the  human  mind  can  derive  from  these  realities 
rational  principles  which  it  sees  to  be  necessarily  and  universally 
applicable  to  all  the  data  of  experience,  we  can  demonstrate  the 
existence  of  a  Necessary  Being,  a  First  and  Self-Existent  Intelli- 
gence. Realizing,  then,  that  God  has  created  all  things  according 
to  Infinite  Wisdom,  we  can  see  that  the  essences  of  things  are 
imitations  of  exemplar  ideas  in  the  Divine  Mind  (20).  On  the 
Divine  Mind  they  depend  essentially  for  their  reality  and  intel- 
ligibility. It  is  because  all  created  realities,  including  the  human 
mind  itself,  are  adumbrations  of  the  Divine  Essence,  that  they  are 
intelligible  to  the  human  mind  Thus  we  see  that  in  the  onto- 
logical  order,  in  the  order  of  real  gradation  and  dependence 
among  things,  as  distinct  from  the  order  of  human  experience,1 
the  reason  why  reality  has  ontological  truth  for  the  human  mind 
is  because  it  is  antecedently  and  essentially  in  accord  with  the 
Divine  Mind  from  which  it  derives  its  intelligibility.  Although, 
therefore,  ontological  truth  is  for  us  proximately  and  immediately 
the  conformity  of  reality  with  our  own  conceptions,  it  is  primarily 
and  fundamentally  the  essential  conformity  of  all  reality  with  the 
Divine  Mind.  All  reality,  actual  and  possible,  including  the 
Divine  Essence  itself,  is  actually  comprehended  by  the  Divine 
Mind,  is  actually  in  conformity  with  the  exemplar  ideas  in  the 
Divine  Mind,  and  has  therefore  ontological  truth  even  independ- 
ently of  its  relation  to  created  minds;  but  "in  the  (impossible) 
hypothesis  of  the  absence  of  all  intellect,  such  a  thing  as  truth 
would  be  inconceivable".2 

The  reason,  therefore,  why  things  are  ontologically  true  for 
our  minds,  why  our  minds  can  apprehend  their  essences,  why  we 
can  have  any  true  knowledge  about  them,  is  in  fact  because  both 
our  minds  and  all  things  else,  being  expressions  of  the  Divine 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §§  252-4. 

2  "  Si  omnis  intellectus  (quod  est  impossibile)  intelligeretur  auferri,  nullo  mode 
ratio  veritatis  remaneret." — ST,  THOMAS,  De  Veritate,  q.  i.,  art  i,  2  in  fine, 

II 


1 62  ONTOLOGY 

Essence,  are  in  essential  conformity  with  the  Divine  Intellect. 
Not  that  we  must  know  all  this  in  order  to  have  any  logical 
truth,  any  true  knowledge,  about  things ;  or  in  order  to  ascribe 
to  things  the  ontological  truth  which  consists  in  their  conformity 
with  our  conception  of  their  nature.  The  atheist  can  have  a  true 
knowledge  of  things  and  can  recognize  in  them  their  conformity 
with  his  mental  conception  of  their  nature ;  only  he  is  unaware 
of  the  real  and  fundamental  reason  why  he  can  do  so.  Nor  can 
he,  of  course,  while  denying  the  existence  of  God,  rise  to  the 
fuller  conception  of  ontological  truth  which  consists  in  the 
essential  conformity  of  all  reality  with  the  Divine  Intellect,  and 
its  essential  dependence  on  the  latter  for  its  intelligibility  to  the 
human  intellect. 

Naturally,  it  is  this  latter  and  fuller  conception  of  ontological 
truth  that  has  been  at  all  times  expounded  by  scholastic  phil- 
osophers.1 We  may  therefore,  define  ontological  truth  as  the 
essential  conformity  of  reality,  as  an  object  of  thought,  with  intellect, 
and  primarily  and  especially  with  the  Divine  Intellect. 

The  conformity  of  reality  with  the  Divine  Intellect  is  described  as  essential 
to  reality,  in  the  sense  that  the  reality  is  dependent  on  the  Divine  Intellect  for 
its  intelligibility  ;  it  derives  its  intelligibility  from  the  latter.  The  conformity 
of  reality  with  the  human  intellect  is  also  essential  in  the  sense  that  potential 
conformity  with  the  latter  is  inseparable  from  reality ;  it  is  an  aspect  really 
identical  with,  and  only  logically  distinct  from,  the  latter.  But  inasmuch  as 
the  actual  conformity  of  reality  with  our  human  conception  of  it  is  contingent 
on  the  existence  of  human  intelligences,  and  is  not  ultimately  dependent  on 
the  latter,  inasmuch  as  reality  does  not  derive  its  intelligibility  ultimately 
from  this  conception — seeing  that  rather  this  conception  is  derived  from  the 
reality  and  is  ultimately  dependent  on  the  Divine  Exemplar, — this  conformity 
of  reality  with  the  human  mind  is  sometimes  spoken  of  as  accidental  to  reality, 
in  contrast  with  the  relation  of  dependence  which  exists  between  reality  and 
the  Divine  Mind. 

Bearing  in  mind  that  reality  derives  its  intelligibility  from  its  essential 
conformity  with  the  Divine  Mind,  and  that  the  human  mind  derives  its  truth 
from  the  reality,  we  can  understand  how  it  has  been  said  of  truth  in  general 
that  it  is  first  in  the  Uncreated  Intellect,  then  in  things,  then  in  created  intel- 
lects ;  that  the  primary  source  and  measure  of  all  truth  is  the  Divine  Intellect, 
Itself  Unmeasured,  "  mensurans,  non  mensuratus  "  ;  that  created  reality  is 
measured  by,  or  conformed  with,  the  Divine  Intellect,  and  is  in  turn  the 
measure  of  the  human  intellect,  conforming  the  latter  with  itself,  "  mensurans 
et  mensurata "  ;  and  that,  finally,  the  human  intellect,  measured  by  created 
reality  and  the  Divine  Mind,  is  itself  the  measure  of  no  natural  things  but 
only  of  the  products  of  human  art,  "  intellectus  noster  .  .  .  non  mensurans 
quidem  res  naturales,  sed  artificiales  tantum  ".3 

1 C/.  ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veritate,  q.  i.,  and  passim. 
3  ST,  THOMAS,  De  Verilate,  q.  i.,  art,  3, 


REALITY  AND  THE  TRUE  163 

Is  truth  one,  then,  or  is  it  manifold?  Logical  truth  is  manifold — multi- 
plied by  the  number  of  created  intelligences,  and  by  the  number  of  distinct 
cognitions  in  each.  The  primary  ontological  truth  which  consists  in  the  con- 
formity of  all  reality  with  the  Divine  Intellect  is  one  :  there  is  no  real  plurality 
of  archetype  ideas  in  the  Divine  Mind  ;  they  are  manifold  only  to  our  im- 
perfect human  mode  of  thinking.  The  secondary  ontological  truth  which 
consists  in  the  conformity  of  things  with  the  abstract  concepts  of  created  in- 
telligences is  conditioned  by,  and  multiplied  with,  the  manifoldness  of  the 
latter.1 

Again  to  the  question:  Is  truth  eternal  or  temporal? — we  reply  in  a 
similar  way  that  the  truth  of  the  Divine  comprehension  of  reality,  actual  and 
possible,  is  eternal,  but  that  no  other  truth  is  eternal.  There  is  no  eternal 
truth  outside  of  God.  Created  things  are  not  eternal ;  and  truth  is  consecu- 
tive on  reality  :  where  there  is  no  reality  there  is  no  ontological  truth  :  the 
conformity  of  things  with  human  conceptions  and  the  logical  truth  of  the 
latter  are  both  alike  temporal.2 

Finally,  we  may  say  that  the  truth  of  the  Divine  Intellect  is  immutable  ; 
and  so  is  the  essential  conformity  of  all  reality  with  the  Divine  Intellect.  The 
change  to  which  created  reality  is  essentially  subject  is  itself  essentially  con- 
formed with  the  Divine  Mind  ;  it  is,  so  to  speak,  part  and  parcel  of  the  onto- 
logical truth  of  this  reality  in  relation  to  the  Divine  Mind,  and  cannot  there- 
fore interfere  with  this  ontological  truth.  When  the  acorn  grows  into  the 
oak  the  whole  process  has  its  ontological  truth ;  that  of  the  acorn  changes, 
not  into  falsity,  but  into  another  truth,  that  of  the  oak.3  We  see,  then,  that 
as  things  change,  their  truth  does  not  change  in  the  «ense  of  being  lost  or 
giving  place  to  falsity  :  the  truth  of  one  state  changes  to  the  truth  of  another 
while  the  ontological  truth  of  the  changing  reality  perseveres  immutably. 

The  same  immutability  attaches  to  the  truth  of  things  in  relation  to  the 
human  mind  :  with  the  qualification,  to  which  we  shall  return  (43),  that  they 
may  octasion  false  judgments  in  the  human  mind,  and  on  that  account  be 
designated  "false". 

Finally,  the  logical  truth  which  has  its  seat  in  created  intelligences  is 
mutable  :  it  may  be  increased  or  diminished,  acquired  or  lost. 

42.  ONTOLOGICAL  TRUTH  A  TRANSCENDENTAL  ATTRIBUTE 
OF  REALITY. — From  what  has  been  said  it  will  be  apparent  that 
ontological  truth  is  a  transcendental  attribute  of  reality.  That 
is  to  say,  whatever  is  real,  whether  actual  or  possible,  is  ontologi- 
cally  true  ;  or,  in  scholastic  terminology,  "  Omne  ens  est  verum  ; 
Ens  et  verum  convertuntur :  All  being  is  true ;  The  real  and  the 
true  are  convertible  terms  ".  For  in  the  first  place  there  is  no 

1  ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veritate,  q.  i.,  art.  4  ;  Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  16,  art.  6. 

2 "  Si  intellectus  humanus  non  esset,  adhuc  res  dicerentur  verae  in  ordine 
ad  intellectum  divinum.  Sed  si  uterque  intellectus,  quod  est  impossibile,  intelli- 
geretur  auferri,  nullo  modo  ratio  veritatis  remaneret." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veritate, 
q.  i.,  art.  2. 

3  "  Si  ergo  accipiatur  veritas  rei  secundum  ordinem  ad  intellectum  divinum, 
tune  quidem  mutatur  veritas  rei  mutablis  in  aliam  veritatem,  non  in  falsitatem."— - 
ST.  THOMAS,  ibid.,  q.  i.,  art.  6, 


1 64  ONTOLOGY 

mode  or  category  of  real  being,  of  which  the  human  mind  actually 
thinks,  to  which  it  does  not  attribute  ontological  truth  in  the 
sense  of  conformity  with  the  right  human  conception  of  it. 
Moreover,  the  proper  object  of  the  human  intellect  is  reality ;  all 
true  knowledge  is  knowledge  of  reality.  Reality  of  itself  is 
manifestly  knowable,  intelligible,  and  thus  potentially  or  funda- 
mentally true ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  intellect  is,  according  to 
the  measure  of  its  capacity,  a  faculty  of  insight  into  all  reality, 
into  whatever  is  real :  intellectus  potens  fieri  omnia  ;  anima  .  .  . 
quodammodo  fit  omnia}-  Deny  either  of  these  postulates  regard- 
ing the  terms  of  the  ontological  relation,  reality  and  mind,  and 
all  rational  thought  is  instantly  paralysed.  Hence,  in  so  far  as 
a  reality  becomes  an  actual  object  of  human  knowledge  it  has 
formal  ontological  truth  in  relation  both  to  the  human  mind  and 
to  the  Divine  Mind ;  while  antecedently  to  human  thought  it  is 
fundamentally  true,  or  intelligible,  to  the  human  mind,  and  of 
course  formally  true  in  relation  to  the  Divine  Mind. 

Thus  we  see  that  whatever  is  real  is  ontologically  true ;  that 
ontological  truth  is  really  identical  with  real  being ;  that,  applied 
to  the  latter,  it  is  not  a  mere  extrinsic  denomination,  but  signifies 
an  intrinsic,  positive  aspect  of  reality,  viz.  the  real,  essential,  or 
transcendental  relation  of  all  real  being  to  Mind  or  Intellect :  a 
relation  which  is  logically  or  conceptually  distinct  from  the  notion 
of  reality  considered  in  itself. 

43.  ATTRIBUTION  OF  FALSITY  TO  REAL  BEING.— If  onto- 
logical truth  is  really  identical  with  real  being,  if  it  is  an  essential 
aspect  of  the  latter,  a  transcendental  relation  of  reality  to  mind, 
it  follows  immediately  that  there  can  be  no  such  thing  as  tran- 
scendental falsity  :  if  whatever  is  real  is  ontologically  true,  then 
the  ontologically  false  must  be  the  unreal,  must  be  nothingness. 
And  this  is  really  so :  ontologically  falsity  is  nothingness.  We 
have,  therefore,  to  discover  the  real  meaning  of  attributing  falsity 
to  things,  as  when  we  speak  of  a  false  friend,  false  gold,  false 
teeth,  a  false  musical  note,  a  false  measure  in  poetry,  etc. 

First  of  all,  then,  it  will  be  noted  that  each  such  object  has 
its  own  real  nature  and  character,  its  proper  mental  correlate, 
and,  therefore,  its  ontological  truth.  The  false  friend  is  a  true  or 
real  deceiver,  or  traitor,  or  coward,  or  whatever  his  real  character 
may  be ;  the  false  gold  is  true  or  real  bronze,  or  alloy,  or  what- 
ever it  may  be  in  reality  ;  the  false  teeth  are  true  or  real  ivory, 

i  C/.  ARISTOTLE,  De  Anima,  Hi. ;  ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veritate,  q,  i.,  art.  i. 


REALITY  AND  THE  TRUE  165 

or  whatever  substance  they  are  made  of;  a  false  musical  note  is 
a  true  or  real  note  but  not  the  proper  one  in  its  actual  setting ; 
and  so  of  a  false  measure  in  poetry.  Next,  when  we  thus  ascribe 
falsity  to  a  friend,  or  gold,  or  such  like,  we  see  that  the  epithet 
"  false  "  is  in  reality  merely  transferred  from  the  false  judgment 
which  a  person  is  liable  to  make  about  the  object.  We  mean 
that  to  judge  that  person  a  friend,  or  that  substance  gold,  or  those 
articles  real  teeth,  would  be  to  form  a  false  judgment.  We  see 
that  it  is  only  in  the  judgment  there  can  be  falsity ;  but  we 
transfer  the  epithet  to  the  object  because  the  object  is  likely  to  oc- 
casion the  erroneous  judgment  in  the  fallible  human  mind,  by  reason 
of  the  resemblance  of  the  object  to  something  else  which  it  really  is 
not.  We  see,  therefore,  that  falsity  is  not  in  the  objects,  but  is  trans- 
ferred to  them  by  a  purely  extrinsic  denomination  on  account  of 
appearances  calculated  to  mislead.  We  commonly  say,  in  such 
cases  that  "  things  mislead  us,"  that  "appearances  deceive  us". 
Things,  however,  do  not  deceive  or  mislead  us  necessarily,  but 
only  accidentally :  they  are  the  occasions  of  our  allowing  ourselves 
to  be  deceived  :  the  fallibility  and  limitations  of  our  own  minds 
in  interpreting  reality  are  the  real  cause  of  our  erroneous  judg- 
ments.1 

Secondly,  there  is  another  improper  sense  in  which  we  attri- 
bute falsity  to  works  of  art  which  fail  to  realize  the  artist's  ideal. 
In  this  sense  we  speak  of  a  "  false  "  note  in  music,  a  "  false " 
measure  in  poetry,  a  "  false  "  tint  in  painting,  a  " false"  curve  in 
sculpture  or  architecture.  "  False  "  here  means  defective,  bad, 
wanting  in  perfection.  The  object  being  out  of  harmony  with 
the  ideal  or  design  in  the  practical  intellect  of  the  artist,  we  de- 
scribe it  as  "  false  "  after  the  analogy  of  what  takes  place  when 
we  describe  as  "  false  gold  "  a  substance  which  is  out  of  harmony 
with  the  idea  of  gold  in  the  speculative  intellect.  It  is  in  rela- 
tion to  the  speculative,  not  the  practical,  intellect,  that  things 
have  ontological  truth.  All  created  things  are,  of  course,  as  such, 
in  conformity  not  only  with  the  Divine  Intellect  considered  as 
speculative,  but  also  with  the  Divine  Intellect  considered  as 

1 "  Res  per  se  non  fallunt,  sed  per  accidens.  Dant  enim  occasionem  falsitatis ; 
eo  quod  similitudinem  eorum  gerunt  quorum  non  habent  existentiam.  .  .  .  Res 
notitiam  sui  facit  in  anima  per  ea  quae  de  ipsa  exterius  apparent  .  .  .  et  ideo 
quando  in  aliqua  re  apparent  sensibiles  qualitates  demonstrantes  naturam  quae  eis 
non  subest,  dicitur  res  ilia  esse  falsa.  .  .  .  Nee  tamen  res  est  hoc  modo  causa 
falsitatis  in  anima,  quodnecessariofalsitatem  causat." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol., 
i.,  q.  17,  art.  i.,  ad.  2  ;  De  Veritate,  q.  i.,  art.  10,  c. 


166  ONTOLOGY 

practical.  For  God,  being  omnipotent,  does  all  things  according 
to  the  designs  of  His  Wisdom.  For  Him  nothing  is  accidental, 
nothing  happens  by  chance.  But  the  world  He  has  freely  willed 
to  create  is  not  the  best  possible  world.  Both  in  the  physical 
and  in  the  moral  order  there  are  things  and  events  which  are 
defective,  which  fall  short  of  their  natural  perfection.  This  de- 
fectiveness,  which  is  properly  physical  or  moral  evil,  is  sometimes 
described  as  falsity,  lying,  vanity,  etc.,  on  account  of  the  dis- 
crepancy between  those  things  and  the  ideal  of  what  they  should 
be.  But  all  such  defective  realities  are  known  to  be  what  they 
are  by  the  Divine  Mind,  and  may  be  known  as  they  really  are  by 
the  human  mind.  They  have,  therefore,  their  ontological  truth. 
The  question  of  their  perfection  or  imperfection  gives  rise  to  the 
consideration  of  quite  a  different  aspect  of  reality,  namely  its 
goodness.  This,  then,  we  must  deal  with  in  the  next  place. 


CHAPTER  VI. 
REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD. 

44.  THE  GOOD  AS  "  DESIRABLE  "  AND  AS  "  SUITABLE  ". — 
The  notion  of  the  good  (L.  bonum  ;  Gr.  dyaQov)  is  one  of  the 
most  familiar  of  all  notions.  But  like  all  other  transcendental 
or  widely  generic  concepts,  the  analysis  of  it  opens  up  some 
fundamental  questions.  The  princes  of  ancient  Greek  philosophy, 
Socrates,  Plato  and  Aristotle,  gave  much  anxious  thought  to  its 
elucidation.  The  tentative  gropings  of  Socrates  involved  an 
ambiguity  which  issued  in  the  conflicting  philosophies  of  Stoicism 
and  Epicureanism.  Nor  did  Plato  succeed  in  bringing  down 
from  the  clouds  the  "  Idea  of  the  Good  "  which  he  so  devotedly 
worshipped  as  the  Sun  of  the  Intellectual  World.  It  needed 
the  more  sober  and  searching  analysis  of  the  Stagyrite  to  bring 
to  light  the  formula  so  universally  accepted  in  after  ages :  The 
Good  of  beings  is  that  which  all  desire  :  Bonum  est  quod  omnia 
appetunt}-  Let  us  try  to  reach  the  fundamental  idea  underlying 
the  terms  "  good,"  "  goodness,"  by  some  simple  examples. 

The  child,  deriving  sensible  pleasure  from  a  sweetmeat,  crys 
out :  That  is  good !  Whatever  gratifies  its  senses,  gives  it 
sensible  delight,  it  likes  or  loves.  Such  things  it  desires,  seeks, 
yearns  for,  in  their  absence ;  and  in  their  presence  enjoys.  At 
this  stage  the  good  means  simply  the  pleasure-giving.  But  as 
reason  develops  the  human  being  apprehends  and  describes  as 
good  not  merely  what  is  pleasure-giving,  but  whatever  satisfies 
any  natural  need  or  craving,  whether  purely  organic,  or  purely 
intellectual,  or  more  widely  human  :  food  is  good  because  it 
satisfies  a  physical,  organic  craving ;  knowledge  is  good  because 
it  satisfies  a  natural  intellectual  thirst ;  friendship  is  good  because 
it  satisfies  a  wider  need  of  the  heart.  Here  we  notice  a  transition 
from  "  agreeable  "  in  the  sense  of  "  pleasure-giving  "to  "  agree- 
able "  in  the  more  proper  sense  of  "  suitable  "  or  useful.  The 
good  is  now  conceived  not  in  the  narrow  sense  of  what  yields 

1  Ka\ws  aircffawro  rkyaSbv,  ov  ireWa  tyfcrat. — ARISTOTLE,  Eth.,  i. 

167 


i68  ONTOLOGY 

sensible  pleasure  but  in  the  wider  sense  of  that  which  is  useful  or 
suitable  for  the  satisfaction  of  a  natural  tendency  or  need,  that 
which  is  the  object  of  a  natural  tendency. 

Next,  let  us  reflect,  with  Aristotle,  that  each  of  the  individual 
persons  and  things  that  make  up  the  world  of  our  direct  ex- 
perience has  an  end  towards  which  it  naturally  tends.  There  is 
a  purpose  in  the  existence  of  each.  Each  has  a  nature,  i.e.  an 
essence  which  is  for  it  a  principle  of  development,  a  source  of  all 
the  functions  and  activities  whereby  it  continually  adapts  itself 
to  its  environment  and  thereby  continually  fulfils  the  aim  of  its 
existence.  By  its  very  nature  it  tends  towards  its  end  along  the 
proper  line  of  its  development.1  In  the  world  of  conscious 
beings  this  natural  tendency  is  properly  called  appetite  :  sense 
appetite  of  what  is  apprehended  as  good  by  sense  cognition,  and 
rational  appetite  or  will  in  regard  to  what  is  apprehended  as 
good  by  intellect  or  reason.  In  the  world  of  unconscious  things 
this  natural  tendency  is  a  real  tendency  and  is  analogous  to 
conscious  appetite.  Hence  it  is  that  Aristotle,  taking  in  all 
grades  of  real  being,  describes  the  good  as  that  which  is  the 
object  of  any  natural  tendency  or  "  appetite  "  whatsoever  :  the 
good  is  the  " appetibile"  or  "desirable,"  that  which  all  things 
seek  :  bonum  est  quod  omnia  appetunt. 

45.  THE  GOOD  AS  AN  "  END,"  "  PERFECTING  "  THE  "  NATURE  ". 
— So  far,  we  have  analysed  the  notion  of  what  is  "  good  "  for 
some  being ;  and  we  have  gathered  that  it  implies  what  suits  this 
being,  what  contributes  to  the  latter's  realization  of  its  end.  But 
we  apply  the  term  "good"  to  objects,  and  speak  of  their  good- 
ness, apart  from  their  direct  and  immediate  relation  of  helpfulness 
or  suitability  for  us.  When,  for  instance,  we  say  of  a  watch  that 
it  is  a  good  one,  or  of  a  soldier  that  he  is  a  good  soldier,  what 
precisely  do  we  mean  by  such  attribution  of  goodness  to  things 
or  persons  ?  A  little  reflection  will  show  that  it  is  intelligible 
only  in  reference  to  an  end  or  purpose.  And  we  mean  by  it  that 
the  being  we  describe  as  good  has  the  powers,  qualities,  equip- 
ments, which  fit  it  for  its  end  or  purpose.  A  being  is  good  whose 
nature  is  equipped  and  adapted  for  the  realization  of  its  natural 
end  or  purpose. 

Thus  we  see  that  the  notion  of  goodness  is  correlative  with 
the  notion  of  an  end,  towards  which,  or  for  which,  a  being  has  a 
natural  tendency  or  desire.  Without  the  concept  of  a  nature  as 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  217. 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  169 

tending  to  realize  an  end  or  purpose,  the  notion  of  "the  good" 
would  be  inexplicable.1  And  the  two  formulae,  "  The  good  is 
that  which  beings  desire,  or  towards  which  they  naturally  tend," 
and  "  The  good  is  that  which  is  adapted  to  the  ends  which  beings 
have  in  their  existence,"  really  come  to  the  same  thing ;  the 
former  statement  resolving  itself  into  the  latter  as  the  more 
fundamental.  For  the  reason  why  anything  is  desirable,  why  it 
is  the  object  of  a  natural  tendency,  is  because  it  is  good,  and  not 
vice  versa.  The  description  of  the  good  as  that  which  is  desir- 
able, "  Bonum  est  id  quod  est  appetibile"  is  an  a  posteriori  descrip- 
tion, a  description  of  cause  by  reference  to  effect.2  A  thing  is 
desirable  because  it  is  good.  Why  then  is  it  good,  and  therefore 
desirable  ?  Because  it  suits  the  natural  needs,  and  is  adapted  to 
the  nature,  of  the  being  that  desires  it  or  tends  towards  it ; 
because  it  helps  this  being,  agrees  with  it,  by  contributing  towards 
the  realization  of  its  end  :  Bonum  est  id  quod  convenit  naturcz 
appetentis :  The  good  is  that  which  suits  the  nature  of  the  being 
that  desires  it.  The  greatest  good  for  a  being  is  the  realization 
of  its  end  ;  and  the  means  towards  this  are  also  good  because 
they  contribute  to  this  realization. 

No  doubt,  in  beings  endowed  with  consciousness  the  gradual 
realization  of  this  natural  tendency,  by  the  normal  functioning 
and  development  of  their  activities,  is  accompanied  by  pleasurable 
feeling.  The  latter  is,  in  fact,  not  an  end  of  action  itself,  but 
rather  the  natural  concomitant,  the  effect  and  index,  of  the 
healthy  and  normal  activity  of  the  conscious  being :  delectatio 
sequitur  operationem  debitam.  It  is  the  pleasure  felt  in  tending 
towards  the  good  that  reveals  the  good  to  the  conscious  agent : 
that  is,  taking  pleasure  in  its  wide  sense  as  the  feeling  of  well- 
being,  of  satisfaction  with  one's  whole  condition,  activities  and 
environment.  Hence  it  is  the  anticipated  pleasure,  connected 
by  past  association  with  a  certain  line  of  action,  that  stimulates 
the  conscious  being  to  act  in  that  way  again.  It  is  in  the  first 
instance  because  a  certain  operation  or  tendency  is  felt  to  be 

1 "  Bonum  autem,  cum  habeat  notionem  appetibilis,  importat  habitudinem 
causae  finalis." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  5,  art.  2,  ad.  i. 

2  "  Prima  autem  non  possunt  notificari  per  aliqua  priora,  sed  notificantur  per 
posteriora,  sicut  causse  per  proprios  effectus.  Cum  autem  bonum  proprie  sit 
motivum  appetitus,  describitur  bonum  per  motum  appetitus,  sicut  solet  manifestari 
vis  motiva  per  motum.  Et  ideo  dicit  (Aristoteles)  quod  philosophi  bene  enunciaverunt 
bonum  esse  id  quod  omnia  appetunt." — ST.  THOMAS,  Comment,  in  Eth.  Nick.,  i., 
lect.  i  a. 


1 70  ONTOLOGY 

pleasing  that  it  is  desired,  and  apprehended  as  desirable.  Nor 
does  the  brute  beast  recognize  or  respond  to  any  stimulus  of 
action  other  than  pleasure.  But  man — endowed  with  reason,  and 
reflecting  on  the  relation  between  his  own  nature  and  the 
activities  whereby  he  duly  orients  his  life  in  his  environment — 
must  see  that  what  is  pleasure-giving  or  "agreeable"  in  the 
ordinary  sense  of  this  term  is  generally  so  because  it  is  "  agree- 
able" in  the  deeper  sense  of  being  "suitable  to  his  nature," 
"adapted  to  his  end,"  and  therefore  "good". 

The  good,  then,  is  whatever  suits  the  nature  of  a  being  tending 
towards  its  end :  bonum  est  conveniens  natures  appetentis.  In  what 
precisely  does  this  suitability  consist  ?  What  suits  any  nature 
perfects  that  nature,  and  suits  it  precisely  in  so  far  as  it  perfects  it. 
But  whatever  perfects  a  nature  does  so  only  because  and  in  so  far 
as  it  is  a  realization  of  the  end  towards  which  this  nature  tends. 
Here  we  reach  a  new  notion,  that  of"  perfecting  "  or  "  perfection," 
and  one  which  is  as  essentially  connected  with  the  notion  of 
"  end  "  or  "  purpose,"  as  the  concept  of  the  "  good  "  itself  is. 
Let  us  compare  these  notions  of  "  goodness,"  "end,"  and  "per- 
fection ".  We  have  said  that  a  watch  or  a  soldier  are  good  when 
they  are  adapted  to  their  respective  ends.  But  they  are  so  only 
because  the  end  itself  is  already  good.  And  we  may  ask  why 
any  such  end  is  itself  good  and  therefore  desirable.  For  example, 
why  is  the  accurate  indication  of  time  good,  or  the  defence  of 
one's  country?  And  obviously  in  such  a  series  of  questions  we 
must  come  to  something  which  is  good  and  desirable  in  and  for 
itself,  for  its  own  sake  and  not  as  leading  and  helping  towards 
some  remoter  good.  And  this  something  which  is  good  in  and 
for  itself  is  a  last  or  ultimate  end — an  absolute,  not  a  relative, 
good.  There  must  be  such  an  absolute  good,  such  an  ultimate 
end,  if  goodness  in  things  is  to  be  made  intelligible  at  all.  And 
it  is  only  in  so  far  as  things  tend  towards  this  absolute  good,  and 
are  adapted  to  it,  that  they  can  be  termed  good.  The  realiza- 
tion of  this  tendency  of  things  towards  the  absolute  good,  or 
ultimate  end,  is  what  constitutes .  the  goodness  of  those  things, 
and  it  does  so  because  it  perfects  their  natures. 

The  end  towards  which  any  nature  tends  is  the  cause  of  this  tendency, 
its  final  cause  ;  and  the  influence  of  a  final  cause  consists  precisely  in  its 
goodness,  i.e.  in  its  power  of  actualizing  and  perfecting  a  nature.  This 
influence  of  the  good  is  sometimes  described  as  the  "  diffusive  "  character  of 
goodness  :  Bonum  est  diffusivum  sui :  Goodness  tends  to  diffuse  or  com- 


i  REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  171 

municate  itself,  to  multiply  or  reproduce  itself.  This  character,  which  we  may 
recognize  in  the  goodness  of  finite,  created  things,  is  explained  in  the  philo- 
sophy of  theism  as  being  derived,  with  this  goodness  itself,  from  the  uncreated 
goodness  of  God  who  is  the  Ultimate  End  and  Supreme  Good  of  all  reality. 
Every  creature  has  its  own  proper  ultimate  end  and  highest  perfection  in  its 
being  a  manifestion,  an  expression,  a  shewing  forth,  of  the  Divine  Goodness. 
It  has  its  own  actuality  and  goodness,  distinct  from,  but  dependent  on,  the 
Divine  Goodness ;  but  inasmuch  as  its  goodness  is  an  expression  or  imitation 
of  the  Divine  Goodness,  we  may,  by  an  extrinsic  denomination,  say  that  the 
creature  is  good  by  the  Divine  Goodness.  In  a  similar  way,  and  without 
any  suspicion  of  pantheism,  we  may  speak  of  the  goodness  of  creatures  as  being 
a  participation  of  the  Divine  Goodness  (5). 

46.  THE  PERFECT.  ANALYSIS  OF  THE  NOTION  OF  PERFEC- 
TION.— It  is  the  realization  of  the  end  or  object  or  purpose  of  a 
nature  that  perfects  the  latter,  and  so  far  formally  constitutes  the 
goodness  of  this  nature.  Now  the  notion  of  perfection  is  not 
exactly  the  same  as  the  notion  of  goodness  :  although  what  is 
perfect  is  always  good,  what  is  good  is  not  always  perfect.  The 
term  "perfect "  comes  from  the  Latin perficere, perfectum, meaning 
fully  made,  thoroughly  achieved,  completed,  finished.  Strictly 
speaking,  it  is  only  finite  being,  potential  being,  capable  of  com- 
pletion, that  can  be  spoken  of  as  perfectible,  or,  when  fully  actual- 
ized, perfect.  But  by  universal  usage  the  term  has  been  extended 
to  the  reality  of  the  Infinite  Being :  we  speak  of  the  latter  as  the 
Infinitely  Perfect  Being,  not  meaning  that  this  Being  has  been 
"  perfected,"  but  that  He  is  the  purely  Actual  and  Infinite  Reality. 
Applied  to  any  finite  being,  the  term  "  perfect "  means  that  this 
being  has  attained  to  the  full  actuality  which  we  regard  as  its 
end,  as  the  ideal  of  its  natural  capacity  and  tendency.  The 
finite  being  is  subject  to  change  ;  it  is  not  actualized  all  at  once, 
but  gradually ;  by  the  play  of  those  active  and  passive  powers 
which  are  rooted  in  its  nature  it  is  gradually  actualized,  and  thus 
perfected,  gaining  more  and  more  reality  or  being  by  the  process. 
But  what  directs  this  process  and  determines  the  line  of  its  ten- 
dency ?  The  good  which  is  the  end  of  the  being,  the  good  towards 
which  the  being  by  its  nature  tends.  This  good,  which  is  the 
term  of  the  being's  natural  tendency — which  is,  in  other  words,  its 
end — is  the  fundamental  principle  *  which  perfects  the  nature  of 
the  being,  is  the  source  and  explanation  of  the  process  whereby 

1  The  "  end,"  which  is  last  in  the  order  of  actual  attainment,  is  first  as  the 
ideal  term  of  the  aim  or  tendency  of  the  nature  :  finis  est  ultimus  in  executione,  sed 
primus  in  intentione  ;  it  is  that  for  the  sake  of  which,  and  with  a  view  to  which,  the 
whole  process  of  actualization  or  "  perfecting  "  goes  on.  Cf.  infra,  §  108. 


172  ONTOLOGY 

this  nature  is  perfected :  bonum  est  perfectivum :  the  good  is  the 
perfecting  principle  of  reality.  The  end  itself  is  "the  good  which 
perfects,"  bonum  quod ;  the  "  perfecting "  itself  is  the  formal 
cause  of  the  goodness  of  the  being  that  is  perfected,  bonum  quo  ; 
the  being  itself  which  is  perfected,  and  therefore  ameliorated  or 
increased  in  goodness,  is  the  bonum  cui.  In  proportion,  there- 
fore, to  the  degree  in  which  a  being  actually  possesses  the  perfec- 
tion due  to  its  nature  it  is  "  good  " ;  in  so  far  as  it  lacks  this 
perfection,  it  is  wanting  in  goodness,  or  is,  as  we  shall  see,  onto- 
logically  "bad"  or  "evil  ". 

While,  then,  the  notion  of  the  "good  "  implies  a  relation  of 
the  appetite  or  natural  tendency  of  a  being  towards  its  end,  the 
notion  of  "  perfection,"  or  "perfecting,"  conveys  to  our  minds 
actual  reality  simply,  or  the  actualizing  of  reality.  The  term 
"  perfection "  is  commonly  used  as  synonymous  with  actual 
reality.  In  so  far  forth  as  a  reality  is  actual  we  say  it  "  has  per- 
fection ".  But  we  do  not  call  it  "  perfect  "  simply,  unless  it  has 
all  the  actuality  we  conceive  to  be  due  to  its  nature :  so  long  as 
it  lacks  any  of  this  it  is  only  perfect  secundum  quid,  i.e.  in  pro- 
portion to  the  actuality  it  does  possess.  Hence  we  define  "  the 
perfect  "  as  that  which  is  actually  lacking  in  nothing  that  is  due  to 
its  nature.  The  perfect  is  therefore  not  simply  the  good,  but  the 
complete  or  finished  good  ;  and  it  is  even  logically  distinct  from 
the  latter,  inasmuch  as  the  actuality  connoted  by  the  former 
has  added  to  it  the  relation  to  appetite  connoted  by  the  latter. 
Similarly  "goodness"  is  logically  distinct  from  "perfection" 
by  adding  the  like  relation  to  the  latter.  Although  a  thing  has 
goodness  in  so  far  as  it  has  perfection,  and  vice  versa,  still  its  per- 
fection is  its  actuality  simply,  while  its  goodness  is  this  actuality 
considered  as  the  term  of  its  natural  appetite  or  tendency. 

47.  GRADES  OF  PERFECTION.  REALITY  AS  STANDARD  OF 
VALUE. — We  may  distinguish  between  stages  of  perfection  in 
the  changing  reality  of  the  same  being,  or  grades  of  perfection  in 
comparing  with  one  another  different  classes  or  orders  of  being. 

In  one  and  the  same  being  we  may  distinguish  between  what 
is  called  'tis  first  or  essential  perfection,  which  means  its  essence 
or  nature  considered  as  capable  of  realizing  its  purpose  in  exist- 
ence by  tending  effectively  towards  its  end  ;  what  is  called  its 
intermediate  or  accidental  perfection,  which  consists  in  all  the 
powers,  faculties  and  functions  whereby  this  tendency  is  gradu- 
ally actualized;  and  what  is  called  itsjina/or  integral  perfection, 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  173 

which  consists  in  its  full  actualization  by  complete  attainment  of 
its  end. 

Again,  comparing  with  one  another  the  individual  beings 
that  make  up  our  experience,  we  classify  them,  we  arrange  them 
in  a  hierarchical  order  of  relative  "  perfection,"  of  inferiority  or 
superiority,  according  to  the  different  grades  of  reality  or  perfec- 
tion which  we  think  we  apprehend  in  them.  Thus,  we  look  on 
living  things  as  a  higher,  nobler,  more  perfect  order  of  beings 
than  non-living  things,  on  animal  life  as  a  higher  form  of  being 
than  plant  life,  on  intelligence  as  higher  than  instinct,  on  will  as 
superior  to  sense  appetite,  on  mind  or  spirit  as  nobler  than 
matter,  and  so  on.  Now  all  such  comparisons  involve  the 
apprehension  of  some  standard  of  value.  An  estimation  of 
relative  values,  or  relative  grades  of  perfection  in  things,  is  un- 
intelligible except  in  reference  to  some  such  standard  ;  it  in- 
volves of  necessity  the  intuition  of  such  a  standard.  We  feel 
sure  that  some  at  least  of  our  appreciations  are  unquestionably 
correct :  that  man,  for  instance,  is  superior  to  the  brute  beast, 
and  the  latter  superior  to  the  plant ;  that  the  lowest  manifesta- 
tion of  life — in  the  amoeba,  or  whatever  monocellular,  microscopic 
germ  may  be  the  lowest — is  higher  on  the  scale  of  being  than 
the  highest  expression  of  the  mechanical,  chemical  and  physical 
forces  of  the  inorganic  universe.  And  if  we  ask  ourselves  what 
is  our  standard  of  comparison,  what  is  our  test  or  measure,  and 
why  are  we  sure  of  our  application  of  it  in  such  cases,  our  only 
answer  is  that  our  standard  of  comparison  is  reality  itself,  actual 
being,  perfection  ;  that  we  rely  implicitly  on  our  intuition  of  such 
actual  reality  as  manifested  to  us  in  varying  grades  or  degrees 
within  our  experience ;  that  without  claiming  to  be  infallible  in 
our  judgments  of  comparison,  in  our  classifications  of  things,  in 
our  appreciations  of  their  relative  perfection,  we  may  justly 
assume  reality  itself  to  be  as  such  intelligible,  and  the  human  mind 
to  be  capable  of  obtaining  some  true  and  certain  insight  into  the 
nature  of  reality. 

48.  THE  GOOD,  THE  REAL,  AND  THE  ACTUAL.— Having 
compared  "perfection"  with  "goodness"  and  with  " being,"  let 
us  next  compare  the  two  latter  notions  with  each  other.  We 
shall  see  presently  that  every  actual  being  has  its  ontological 
goodness,  that  these  are  in  reality  identical.  But  there  is  a 
logical  distinction  between  them.  In  the  first  place  the  term 
"  being  "  is  applied  par  excellence  to  substances  rather  than  to 


174  ONTOLOGY 

accidents.  But  we  do  not  commonly  speak  of  an  individual 
substance,  a  person  or  thing,  as  good  in  reference  to  essential  or 
substantial  perfection.1  When  we  describe  a  man,  or  a  machine, 
as  "good,"  we  mean  that  the  man  possesses  those  accidental 
perfections,  those  qualities  and  endowments,  which  are  suitable 
to  his  nature  as  a  man ;  that  the  machine  possesses  those  pro- 
perties which  adapt  it  to  its  end.  In  the  second  place  the  notion 
of  being  is  absolute ;  that  of  the  good  is  relative,  for  it  implies 
the  notion  not  of  reality  simply  but  of  reality  as  desirable, 
agreeable,  suitable,  as  perfecting  the  nature  of  a  subject,  as  being 
the  end,  or  conducive  to  the  end,  towards  which  this  nature 
tends.  And  since  what  thus  perfects  must  be  something  not 
potential  but  actual,  it  follows  that,  unlike  real  truth,  real  good- 
ness is  identical  not  with  potential,  but  only  with  actual  reality. 
It  is  not  an  attribute  of  the  abstract,  possible  essence,  but  only 
of  the  concrete,  actually  existing  essence.2 

From  the  fact  that  the  notion  of  the  good  is  relative  it 
follows  that  the  same  thing  can  be  simultaneously  good  and  bad 
in  different  relations :  "  What  is  one  man's  meat  is  another  man's 
poison  ". 

49.  KINDS  OF  GOODNESS;  DIVISIONS  OF  THE  GOOD. — (a) 
The  goodness  of  a  being  may  be  considered  in  relation  to  this 
being  itself,  or  to  other  beings.  What  is  good  for  a  being  itself, 
what  makes  it  intrinsically  and  formally  good,  bonum  sibi>  is 
whatever  perfects  it,  and  in  the  fullest  sense  the  realization  of 
its  end.  Hence  we  speak  of  a  virtuous,  upright  man,  whose 
conduct  is  in  keeping  with  his  nature  and  conducive  to  the 
realization  of  his  end,  as  a  good  man.  But  a  being  may  also  be 
good  to  others,  bonum  alteri,  by  an  extrinsic,  active,  effective 
goodness,  inasmuch  as  by  its  action  it  may  help  other  beings 

1  "  Licet  bonum  et  ens  sint  idem  secundum  rem  ;  quia  tamen  differunt  secun- 
dum  rationem,  non  eodem  modo  dicitur  aliquid  ens  simpliciter  et  bonum  simpliciter. 
Nam,  cum  ens  dicat  aliquid  esse  in  actu,  actus  autem  proprie  ordinem  habeat  ad 
potentiam,  secundum  hoc  simpliciter  aliquid  dicitur  esse  ens  secundum  quod  primo 
secernitur  ab  eo  quod  est  in  potentia  tantum  ;  hoc  autem  est  esse  substantiate  rei 
uniuscuj usque.  Unde  per  suum  esse  substantiale  dicitur  unumquodque  ens 
simpliciter  ;  per  actus  autum  superadditos  dicitur  aliquid  esse  secundum  quid.  .  .  . 
Sic  ergo  secundum  primum  esse,  quod  est  substantiale,  dicitur  aliquid  ens  simpliciter 
et  bonum  secundum  quid,  id  est,  inquantum  est  ens  ;  secundum  vero  ultimum  actum 
dicitur  aliquid  ens  secundum  quid,  et  bonum  simpliciter." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa 
Theol.,  i.,  q.  5,  art.  i,  ad.  i. 

2"Respectus  .  .  .  qui  importatur  nomine  boni  est  habitudo  perfectivi  secundum 
quodaliquid  natumest  perficerenonsolum  secundum  rationem  speciei[i.£.  the  abstract 
essence],  sed  secundum  esse  quod  habet  in  rebus ;  hoc  enim  modo  finis  perficit  ea 
quae  sunt  ad  finem." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Veritate,  q.  26,  art.  6. 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  175 

in  the  realization  of  their  ends.  In  this  sense,  a  beneficent  man, 
who  wishes  the  well-being  of  his  fellow-men  and  helps  them  to 
realize  this  well-being,  is  called  a  good  man.  This  kind  of 
goodness  is  what  is  often  nowadays  styled  philanthropy ;  in 
Christian  ethics  it  is  known  as  charity. 

(ft)  We  have  described  the  good  as  the  term  or  object  of 
natural  tendency  or  appetite.  In  the  domain  of  beings  not 
endowed  with  the  power  of  conscious  apprehension,  determinism 
rules  this  natural  tendency ;  this  latter  is  always  oriented  towards 
the  real  good  :  it  never  acts  amiss  :  it  is  always  directed  by  the 
Divine  Wisdom  which  has  given  to  things  their  natures.  But  in 
the  domain  of  conscious  living  agents  this  natural  tendency  is 
consequent  on  apprehension  :  it  takes  the  form  of  instinctive 
animal  appetite  or  of  rational  volition.  And  since  this  apprehen- 
sion of  the  good  may  be  erroneous,  since  what  is  not  really  good 
but  evil  may  be  apprehended  as  good,  the  appetite  or  will,  which 
follows  this  apprehension — nil  volitum  nisi  praecognitum — may 
be  borne  towards  evil  sub  ratione  boni.  Hence  the  obvious  dis- 
tinction between  real  good  and  apparent  good — bonum  verum  and 
bonum  apparens. 

(c)  In  reference  to  any  individual  subject — a  man,  for  instance 
—it  is  manifest  that  other  beings  can  be  good  for  him  in  so  far 
as  any  of  them  can  be  his  end  or  a  means  to  the  attainment  of 
his  end.     They  are  called  in  reference  to  him  objective  goods>  and 
their  goodness  objective  goodness.     But  it  is  equally  clear  that 
they  are  good  for  him   only  because  he  can  perfect  his  own 
nature  by  somehow  identifying  or  uniting  himself  with  them, 
possessing,   using,  or  enjoying  them.     This  possession  of  the 
objective  good  constitutes  what  has  been  already  referred  to  as 
formal  or  subjective  goodness^ 

(d)  We  have  likewise  already  referred  to  the  fact  that  in 
beings  endowed  with  consciousness  and  appetite  proper,  whether 
sentient  or  rational,  the  function  of  possessing  or  attaining  to 
what  is  objectively  good,  to  what  suits  and  perfects  the  nature  of 
the  subject,  has  for  its  natural  concomitant  a  feeling  of  pleasure, 
satisfaction,    well-being,    delight,    enjoyment.       And    we    have 
observed   that   this   pleasurable   feeling   may   then    become    a 
stimulus  to  fresh  desire,  may  indeed  be  desired  for  its  own  sake. 
Now  this  subjective,  pleasure-giving  possession  of  an  objective 

1  C/.  the  familiar  ethical  distinction  between  objective,  and  formal  or  subjective 
happiness,  beatitudo  objectiva  and  beatitude  form^lfe  $eu  subjective 


176  ONTOLOGY 

good  has  been  itself  called  by  scholastics  bonum  delectabile — 
delectable  or  delight-giving  good.  The  objective  good  itself 
considered  as  an  end,  and  the  perfecting  of  the  subject  by  its 
attainment,  have  been  called  bonum  honestum — good  which  is 
really  and  absolutely  such  in  itself.  While  if  the  good  in  question 
is  really  such  only  when  considered  as  a  means  to  the  attain- 
ment of  an  end,  of  something  that  is  good  in  itself,  the  former  is 
called  bonum  utile — useful  good.1 

In  this  important  triple  division  bonum  honestum  is  used  in 
the  wide  sense  in  which  it  embraces  any  real  good,  whether 
physical  or  moral.  As  applied  to  man  it  would  therefore 
embrace  whatever  perfects  his  physical  life  as  well  as  whatever 
perfects  his  nature  considered  as  a  rational,  and  therefore  moral, 
being.  But  in  common  usage  it  has  been  restricted  to  the  latter, 
and  is  in  this  sense  synonymous  with  moral  good,  virtue? 

Furthermore,  a  good  which  is  an  end,  and  therefore  desirable 
for  its  own  sake,  whether  it  be  physical  or  moral,  can  be  at  the 
same  time  a  means  to  some  higher  good  and  desired  for  the  sake 
of  this  latter.  Hence  St.  Thomas,  following  Aristotle,  reduces 
all  the  moral  goods  which  are  desirable  in  themselves  to  two 
kinds :  that  which  is  desirable  only  for  itself,  which  is  the  last 
end,  final  felicity ;  and  those  which,  while  good  in  themselves, 
are  also  conducive  to  the  former,  and  these  are  the  virtues.3 

When  these  various  kinds  of  goodness  are  examined  in  reference  to  the 
nature,  conduct  and  destiny  of  man,  they  raise  a  multitude  of  problems  which 
belong  properly  to  Ethics  and  Natural  Theology.  The  fact  that  man  has  a 
composite  nature  which  is  the  seat  of  various  and  conflicting  tendencies,  of 
the  flesh  and  of  the  spirit  ;  that  he  perceives  in  himself  a  "  double  law,"  a 
higher  and  a  lower  appetite  ;  that  he  is  subject  to  error  in  his  apprehension 
of  the  good ;  that  he  apprehends  a  distinction  between  pleasure  and  duty  ; 

1 "  In  motu  appetitus,  id  quod  est  appetibile  terminans  motum  appetitus 
secundum  quid,  ut  medium  per  quod  tenditur  in  aliud,  vocatur  utile.  Id  autem  quod 
appetitur  ut  ultimum  terminans  totaliter  motum  appetitus  sicut  quaedam  res  in 
quam  per  se  appetitus  tendit,  vocatur  honestum  ;  quia  honestum  dicitur  quod  per  se 
desideratur.  Id  autem  quod  terminat  motum  appetitus,  ut  quies  in  se  desiderata, 
est  delectabile.1' — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  5,  art.  3. 

2Excellentia  hominis  maxime  consideratur  secundum  virtutem,  quae  est  dis- 
positio  perfecti  ad  optimum,  ut  dicitur  in  6  Physic.  Et  ideo,  honestum,  proprie 
loquendo,  in  idem  refertur  cum  virtute. — ibid.,  2a  aae,  q.  145,  art.  i,  c. 

3"Eorum  quae  propter  se  apprehenduntur,  quaedam  apprehenduntur  solum 
propter  se,  et  nunquam  propter  aliud,  sicut  felicitas,  quae  est  ultimus  finis ;  quaedam 
vero  apprehenduntur  et  propter  se,  in  quantum  habent  in  seipsis  aliquam  rationem 
bonitatis,  etiamsi  nihil  aliud  boni  per  ea  nobis  accideret,  et  tamen  sunt  appetibilia 
propter  aliud,  in  quantum  scilicet  perducunt  nos  in  aliquod  bonum  perfectius :  et 
hoc  modo  virtutes  sunt  propter  se  apprehendendae." — ibid.,  ad  i. 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  177 

that  he  feels  the  latter  to  be  the  path  to  ultimate  happiness, — all  this  accentuates 
the  distinction  between  real  and  apparent  good,  between  bonum  honestum, 
bonum  utile,  and  bonum  delectabile.  The  existence  of  God  is  established  in 
Natural  Theology  ;  and  in  Ethics,  aided  by  Psychology,  it  is  proved  that  no 
finite  good  can  be  the  last  end  of  man,  that  God,  the  Supreme,  Infinite 
Good,  is  his  last  end,  and  that  only  in  the  possession  of  God  by  knowledge 
and  love  can  man  find  his  complete  and  final  felicity. 

50.  GOODNESS  A  TRANSCENDENTAL  ATTRIBUTE  OF  BEING. 
— We  have  shown  that  there  is  a  logical  distinction  between  the 
concept  of  "  goodness  "  and  that  of  "  being  ".  We  have  now  to 
show  that  the  distinction  is  not  real,  in  other  words,  that  goodness 
is  a  transcendental  attribute  of  all  actual  reality,  that  all  being,  in 
so  far  forth  as  it  is  actual,  has  goodness — transcendental  or  onto- 
logical  goodness  in  the  sense  of  appetibility,  desirability,  suitability, 
as  already  explained. 

When  the  thesis  is  formulated  in  the  traditional  scholastic 
statement,  "  Omne  ens  est  bonum  :  All  being  is  good"  it  sounds  a 
startling  paradox.  Surely  it  cannot  be  contended  that  everything 
is  good  ?  A  cancer  in  the  stomach  is  not  good  ;  lies  are  not 
good ;  yet  these  are  actual  realities ;  cancers  exist  and  lies  are 
told  ;  therefore  not  every  reality  is  good.  This  is  unquestionably 
true.  But  it  does  not  contradict  the  thesis  rightly  understood. 
The  true  meaning  of  the  thesis  is,  not  that  every  being  is  good 
in  all  respects,  or  possesses  such  goodness  as  would  justify  us  in 
describing  it  as  "good"  in  the  ordinary  sense,  but  that  every 
being  possesses  some  goodness :  every  being  in  so  far  as  it  has 
actuality  has  formal,  intrinsic  goodness,  or  is,  in  other  words,  the 
term  or  object  of  natural  tendency  or  desire.  This  goodness, 
which  we  predicate  of  any  and  every  actual  being,  may  be  (i)  the 
term  of  the  natural  tendency  or  appetite  of  that  being  itself, 
bonum  sibi,  or  (2)  it  may  be  conceivably  the  term  of  the  appetite 
of  some  other  being,  bonum  alteri.  Let  us  see  whether  it  can  be 
shown  that  every  actual  being  has  goodness  in  one  or  both  of 
these  senses. 

(i)  Bonum  sibi. — Is  there  any  intelligible  sense  in  which  it 
can  be  said  that  the  actuality  of  any  and  every  existing  being  is 
good  for  that  being — bonum  sibi  ?  There  is.  For  if  we  recognize 
in  every  such  being,  as  we  must,  a  nature,  a  potentiality  of 
further  actualization,  a  tendency  towards  a  state  of  fuller  actuality 
which  is  its  end;  and  if,  furthermore,  we  recognize  that  every 
such  being  at  any  instant  not  merely  is  or  exists,  but  is  becoming 
or  changing,  and  thereby  tending  effectively  towards  its  end ;  we 

12 


178  ONTOLOGY 

must  admit  not  merely  that  the  full  attainment  of  its  end  (its 
integral  or  final  perfection)  is  "  desired  "  by,  and  "perfects,"  and  is 
"  good  "  for,  that  being's  nature  ;  but  also  that  the  partial  realiza- 
tion of  its  end,  or,  in  other  words,  the  actuality  it  has  at  any  instant 
in  its  changing  condition  of  existence  (its  accidental  or  inter- 
mediate perfection)  is  similarly  "  good  "  for  it ;  and  even  that  its 
actual  existence  as  compared  with  its  mere  possibility  (its  first 
or  essential  perfection)  is  "desirable"  and  "good"  for  its  nature. 
Actually  existing  beings  are  intelligible  only  because  they  exist 
for  some  end  or  purpose,  which,  by  their  very  existence,  activities, 
operations,  conduct,  they  tend  to  realize.  If  this  be  admitted  we 
cannot  deny  that  the  full  attainment  of  this  end  or  purpose  is 
"  good  "  for  them — suitable,  desirable,  agreeable,  perfecting  them. 
In  so  far  as  they  fail  in  this  purpose  they  are  wanting  in  good- 
ness, they  are  bad,  evil.  For  the  realization  of  their  end  their 
natures  are  endowed  with  appropriate  powers,  faculties,  forces, 
by  the  normal  functioning  of  which  they  gradually  develop  and 
grow  in  actuality.  No  real  being  is  by  nature  inert  or  aimless  ; 
no  real  being  is  without  its  connatural  faculties,  forces  and  func- 
tions. But  the  natural  result  of  all  operation,  of  all  action  and 
interaction  among  things,  is  actualization  of  the  potential, 
amelioration,  development,  growth  in  perfection  and  goodness  by 
gradual  realization  of  ends.  If  by  accident  any  of  these  powers 
is  wanting,  or  acts  amiss  by  failing  to  contribute  its  due  perfec- 
tion to  the  nature,  there  is  in  the  being  a  proportionate  want  of 
goodness — it  is  so  far  bad,  evil.  But,  even  so,  the  nature  of  the 
thing  preserves  its  fundamental  orientation  towards  its  end,  to- 
wards the  perfection  natural  to  it,  and  struggles  as  it  were  against 
the  evil — tries  to  make  good  the  deficiency.  A  cancer  in  the 
stomach  is  never  good  for  the  stomach,  or  for  the  living  subject  of 
which  the  stomach  is  an  organ.  For  the  living  being  the  cancer 
is  an  evil,  a  failure  of  one  of  the  organs  to  discharge  its  functions 
normally,  an  absence  of  a  good,  viz.  the  healthy  functioning  of  an 
organ.  But  the  cancerous  growth,  considered  in  itself  and  for 
itself,  biologically  and  chemically,  has  its  own  nature,  purpose, 
tendencies,  laws ;  nor  can  we  deny  that  its  development  according 
to  these  laws  is  "good"  for  its  specific  nature,1  bonum  sibi. 

It  may  be  asked  how  can  \htfirst  or  essential  perfection  of  an 
existing  substance,  which  is  nothing  else  than  the  actual  existence 
of  the  nature  itself,  be  conceived  as  "  good"  for  this  nature?  It 

1  C/.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  p.  236. 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  179 

is  so  inasmuch  as  the  actual  existence  of  the  substance  is  the 
first  stage  in  ,the  process  by  which  the  nature  tends  towards  its 
end ;  an  existing  nature  desires  and  tends  towards  the  conserva- 
tion of  its  own  being  ; l  hence  the  saying,  "  Self-preservation  is 
the  first  law  of  nature"  ;  and  hence,  too,  the  scholastic  aphorism, 
"  Metius  est  esse  quam  non  esse  ". 

The  argument  just  outlined  tends  to  show  that  every  nature 
of  which  we  can  have  direct  experience,  or  in  other  words  every 
finite,  contingent  nature,  is  bonum  sibi,  formally  and  intrinsically 
good  for  itself. 

It  is,  of  course,  equally  applicable  to  the  Uncreated,  Necessary 
Being  Himself.  The  Infinite  Actuality  of  the  Divine  Nature  is 
essentially  the  term  and  end  of  the  Divine  Love.  Therefore 
every  actual  being  has  intrinsic,  formal  goodness,  whereby  it  is 
bonum  sibi,  i.e.  its  actuality  is,  in  regard  to  its  nature,  really  an 
object  of  tendency,  desire,  appetite,  a  something  that  really  suits 
and  perfects  this  nature.  Thus  understood,  the  thesis  formulates 
no  mere  tautology.  It  makes  a  real  assertion  about  real  being ; 
nor  can  the  truth  of  this  assertion  be  proved  otherwise  than  by 
an  argument  based,  as  ours  is,  on  the  recognition  of  purpose,  of 
final  causality,  of  adaptation  of  means  to  ends,  in  the  actual 
universe  of  our  experience. 

Notwithstanding  all  that  has  been  said,  it  may  still  be  asked 
why  should  those  individual  beings,  whose  existence  we  have 
claimed  to  be  good  for  them,  exist  at  all.  It  will  be  objected 
that  there  exist  multitudes  of  beings  whose  existence  is  mani- 
festly not  good  for  them.  Take,  for  instance,  the  case  of  the 
reprobate.  If  they  wish  their  total  annihilation,  if  they  desire 
the  total  cessation  of  their  being,  rather  than  an  existence  of 
eternal  punishment,  they  undoubtedly  wish  it  as  a  good.  Is 
annihilation  or  absolute  non-existence  really  a  good  for  them  ? 
De  facto  it  is  for  them,  considered  in  their  actual  condition  which 
is  accidental  to  their  nature.  Christ  said  of  the  scandal-giver 
what  is  surely  true  of  the  reprobate :  "  It  were  better  for  that 
man  had  he  never  been  born  ".  We  may  admit,  therefore,  that 
for  the  reprobate  themselves  simple  non-existence  is  more 
desirable,  and  better,  than  their  actual  concrete  state  of  ex- 

1  "  Omnia  .  .  .  quae  jam  habent  esse,  illud  esse  suum  naturaliter  amant,  et 
ipsam  tota  virtute  conservant.  .  .  .  Ipsum  igitur  esse  habet  rationem  boni.  Unde 
sicut  impossibile  est  quod  sit  aliquod  ens  quod  non  habeat  esse,  ita  necesse'est  quod 
omne  ens  sit  bonum  ex  hoc  ipso  quod  habet  esse." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Vcritatc,  q.  21, 
art.  2,  c. 

12  * 


i8o  ONTOLOGY 

istence  as  reprobate :  because  simple  non-existence  is  for  them 
the  simple  negation  of  their  reality,  whereas  the  absolute  and 
irreparable  loss  of  their  last  end,  the  total  frustration  of  the  pur- 
pose for  which  they  came  into  being,  is  for  them  the  greatest 
conceivable  privation.  But  this  condition  of  the  reprobate  is 
accidental  to  their  nature,  alien  to  the  purpose  of  their  being,  a 
self-incurred  failure,  a  deliberate  thwarting  of  their  natural 
tendency.  It  remains  true,  therefore,  that  their  nature  is  good 
though  incapable  of  progress,  its  purpose  is  good  though  frus- 
trated. In  so  far  as  they  have  actual  reality  they  have 
"  essential "  goodness.  Their  natures  still  tend  towards  self- 
conservation  and  the  realization  of  their  end.  They  form  no 
real  exception  to  the  general  truth  that  "it  is  better  to  be  than 
not  to  be :  melius  est  esse  quam  non  esse ".  It  is  not  annihi- 
lation as  such  that  is  desired  by  them,  but  only  as  a  less  evil 
alternative  than  the  eternal  privation  of  their  last  end.1  If  the 
evils  accidentally  and  actually  attaching  to  a  certain  state  of 
existence  make  the  continuance  of  this  state  undesirable  for  a 
being,  it  by  no  means  follows  that  the  continuance  of  this  being 
in  existence,  simply  and  in  itself,  is  less  desirable  than  non- 
existence. 

(2)  Bonum  alter i. — Even,  however,  if  it  were  granted  that 
the  actual  existence  of  some  beings  is  not  good  for  themselves, 
might  it  not  nevertheless  be  good  for  other  beings,  and  in  relation 
to  the  general  scheme  of  things?  Is  there  not  an  intelligible 
sense  in  which  every  actual  being  is  bonum  alterz,  good  for  other 
things  ?  Here  again  the  same  experience  of  actual  reality,  which 
teaches  us  that  each  individual  being  has  a  nature  whereby  it 
tends  to  its  own  good  as  a  particular  end,  also  teaches  us  that 
in  the  general  scheme  of  reality  things  are  helpful  to  one  another, 
nay,  are  intended  by  their  interaction  and  co-operation  with  one 
another  to  subserve  the  wider  end  which  is  the  good  of  the  whole 
system  of  reality.  There  is  little  use  in  puzzling,  as  people 
sometimes  do,  over  the  raison  d'etre  of  individual  things  or 
classes  of  things  in  human  experience,  over  the  good  or  the  evil 
of  the  existence  of  these  things,  over  the  question  whether  or 

1 "  Non-esse  secundum  se  non  est  appetibile,  sed  per  accidens,  inquantum 
scilicet  ablatio  alicujus  mali  est  appetibilis;  quod  malum  quidem  aufertur  per 
non-esse ;  ablatio  vero  mali  non  est  appetibilis,  nisi  inquantum  per  malum  privatur 
quoddam  esse.  Illud  igitur,  quod  per  se  est  appetibile,  est  esse;  non-esse  vero, 
per  accidens  tantum,  inquantum  scilicet  quoddam  esse  appetitur,  quo  homo  non 
sustinet  privari;  et  sic  etiam  per  accidens  non-esse  dicitur  bonum." — ST.  THOMAS, 
Summa  Tkeol.,  i.,  q.  5,  art.  2,  ad.  3. 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  igr 

not  it  would  be  better  that  these  things  should  never  have 
existed,  until  we  have  consulted  not  any  isolated  portion  of 
human  experience  but  this  experience  as  a  whole.  In  this  we 
can  find  sufficient  evidence  for  the  prevalence  of  a  beneficent 
purpose  everywhere.  Not  that  we  can  read  this  purpose  in 
every  detail  of  reality.  Even  when  we  have  convinced  ourselves 
that  all  creation  is  the  work  of  a  Supreme  Being  who  is  Infinite 
Goodness  Itself,  we  cannot  gain  that  full  insight  into  the  secret 
designs  of  His  Providence,  which  would  be  needed  in  order  to 
"justify  His  ways"  in  all  things.  But  when  we  have  convinced 
ourselves  that  the  created  universe  exists  because  God  wills  it, 
we  can  understand  that  every  actual  reality  in  it  must  be 
"good,"  as  being  an  object  or  term  of  the  Divine  Will.  Every 
created  reality  is  thus  bonum  alteri  inasmuch  as  it  is  good  for 
God,  not,  of  course,  in  the  impossible  sense  of  perfecting  Him, 
but  as  an  imitation  and  expression  of  the  Goodness  of  the  Divine 
Nature  Itself.  The  experience  which  enables  us  to  reach  a 
knowledge  of  the  existence  and  nature  of  God,  the  Creator, 
Conserver,  and  Providence  of  the  actual  universe,  also  teaches  us 
that  this  universe  can  have  no  other  ultimate  end  or  good  than 
God  Himself,  i.e.  God's  will  to  manifest  His  goodness  by  the 
extrinsic  glory  which  consists  in  the  knowledge  and  love  of  Him 
by  His  rational  creatures.  The  omnipotence  of  the  Creator, 
His  freedom  in  creating,  and  our  knowledge  of  the  universe  He 
has  actually  chosen  to  create  from  among  indefinite  possible 
worlds,  all  alike  convince  us  that  the  actual  world  is  neither  the 
best  possible  nor  the  worst  possible,  absolutely  speaking.  But 
our  knowledge  of  His  wisdom  and  power  also  convinces  us  that 
for  the  purpose  of  manifesting  His  glory  in  the  measure  and 
degree  in  which  He  has  actually  chosen  to  manifest  it  by  creat- 
ing the  existing  universe,  and  relatively  to  the  attainment  of  this 
specific  purpose,  the  existing  universe  is  the  best  possible. 

51.  OPTIMISM  AND  PESSIMISM.— Those  few  outlines  of  the 
philosophy  of  theism — theses  established  in  Natural  Theology 
—will  reveal  to  us  the  place  of  theism  in  relation  to  ''optimist" 
and  "pessimist"  systems  of  philosophy.  Pessimism,  as  an  out- 
come of  philosophical  speculation,  is  the  proclamation  in  some 
form  or  other  of  the  conviction  that  human  existence,  nay,  exist- 
ence in  general,  is  a  failure,  an  evil.  It  is  the  analogue,  in  re- 
lation to  will,  of  what  scepticism  is  in  relation  to  intellect ;  and 
it  is  no  less  self-contradictory  than  the  latter.  While  the  latter 


182  ONTOLOGY 

points  to  total  paralysis  of  thought,  the  former  involves  a  like 
paralysis  of  all  will,  all  effort,  all  purpose  in  existence — a  philo- 
sophy of  despair,  despondency,  gloom.  Both  are  equally  erron- 
eous, equally  indicative  of  philosophical  failure,  equally  repugnant 
to  the  normal,  healthy  mind.  Optimism  on  the  other  hand  is 
expressive  of  the  conviction  that  good  predominates  in  all  exist- 
ence :  melius  est  esse  quam  non  esse ;  that  at  the  root  of  all 
reality  there  is  a  beneficent  purpose  which  is  ever  being  realized ; 
that  there  is  in  things  not  merely  a  truth  that  can  be  known  but 
a  goodness  that  can  be  loved.  Existence  is  not  an  evil,  life  is 
not  a  failure.  This  is  a  philosophy  of  hope,  buoyancy,  effort  and 
attainment.  But  is  it  true,  or  is  it  an  empty  illusion  ?  Well,  to 
maintain  that  the  actual  universe  is  the  best  absolutely,  would,  of 
course,  be  absurd.  If  Leibniz's  "  Principle  of  Sufficient  Reason  " 
obliged  him  to  contend,  in  face  of  the  painfully  palpable  facts  of 
physical  and  moral  evil  in  the  universe,  that  this  universe  is  the 
best  absolutely  possible,  the  best  that  God  could  create,  we  can 
only  say:  so  much  the  worse  for  his  "Principle  ".  The  true  op- 
timism is  that  of  the  theist  who,  admitting  the  prevalence  of  evil 
in  the  universe,  in  the  sense  to  be  explained  presently,  at  the 
same  time  holds  that  throughout  creation  the  good  predominates, 
that  God's  beneficent  purpose  in  regard  to  individuals  does  in  the 
main  prevail,  and  that  His  glory  is  manifested  in  giving  to  rational 
creatures  the  perfection  and  felicity  of  knowing  and  loving  Him- 
self. For  the  theist,  then,  the  problem  of  the  existence  of  evil  in 
the  universe  assumes  the  general  form  of  reconciling  the  fact  of 
evil  in  God's  creation  with  the  fact  of  God's  infinite  power  and 
goodness.  This  is  a  problem  for  Natural  Theology.  Here  we 
have  merely  to  indicate  some  general  principles  arising  from  the 
consideration  of  evil  as  the  correlative  and  antithesis  of  goodness. 

52.  EVIL  :  ITS  NATURE  AND  CAUSES.  MANICHEISM. — Admit- 
ting the  existence  of  evil  in  the  universe,  the  scholastic  apparently 
withdraws  the  admission  forthwith  by  denying  the  reality  of  evil. 
The  paradox  explains  itself  by  comparing  the  notions  of  good 
and  evil,  and  thus  trying  to  arrive  at  a  proper  conception  of  the 
latter. 

If  ontological  goodness  is  really  identical  with  actual  being, 
if  being  is  good  in  so  far  as  it  is  actual,  then  it  would  appear  that 
ontological  evil  must  be  identical  with  non-being,  nothingness. 
And  so  it  is,  in  the  sense  that  no  evil  is  a  positive,  actual  reality, 
that  all  evil  is  an  absence  of  reality.  But  just  as  the  good,  though 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  183 

really  identical  with  the  actual,  is  nevertheless  logically  distinct 
from  the  latter,  so  is  evil  logically  distinct  from  nothingness,  or 
the  absence  of  reality.  As  we  have  seen,  the  good  is  that  which 
perfects  a  nature,  that  which  is  due  to  a  nature  as  the  realization 
of  the  end  of  the  latter.  So,  too,  is  evil  the  privation  of  any  per- 
fection due  to  a  nature,  the  absence  of  something  positive  and 
something  which  ought  to  be  present.  Evil,  therefore,  is  not  a 
mere  negation  or  absence  of  being  ;  it  is  the  absence  of  a  good, 
or  in  other  words  the  absence  of  a  reality  that  should  be  present. 
All  privation  is  negation,  but  not  vice  versa  ;  for  privation  is  the 
negation  of  something  due :  the  absence  of  virtue  is  a  mere  nega- 
tion in  an  animal,  in  man  it  is  a  privation.  Hence  the  commonly 
accepted  definition  of  evil  :  Malum  est  privatio  boni  debiti  :  Evil 
is  the  privation  of  the  goodness  due  to  a  thing}  Evil  is  always, 
therefore,  a  defect,  a  deficiency.  The  notion  of  evil  is  a  relative, 
not  an  absolute  notion.  As  goodness  is  the  right  relation  of  a 
nature  to  its  proper  end,  so  is  evil  a  failure,  a  defect  in  this  re- 
lation :  Malum  est  privatio  ordinis  adfinem  debitum? 

The  very  finiteness  of  a  finite  being  is  the  absence  of  further 
reality  in  this  being ;  but  as  this  further  reality  is  not  due  to 
such  a  being,  its  absence,  which  has  sometimes  been  improperly 
described  as  "metaphysical  evil,"  is  not  rightly  regarded  as  evil 
at  all :  except,  indeed,  we  were  to  conceive  it  as  happening  to  the 
Infinite  Being  Himself,  which  would  be  a  contradiction  in  thought. 

Evil,  then,  in  its  formal  concept  is  nothing  positive;  it  is 
essentially  negative,  or  rather  privative.  For  this  very  reason, 
when  we  consider  evil  in  the  concrete,  i.e.  as  affecting  actual 
things,  as  occurring  in  the  actual  universe — we  can  scarcely 
speak  of  it  with  propriety  as  "existing," — we  see  that  it  essenti- 
ally involves  some  positive,  real  subject  which  it  affects,  some 
nature  which,  by  affecting,  it  renders  so  far  evil.  Cancer  in  the 
stomach  is  a  real  evil  of  the  stomach,  a  defect,  a  deficiency,  a 
failure,  in  the  adaptation  of  the  stomach  to  its  proper  end.  It  is  J 
not  itself  a  positive,  absolute,  evil  entity.  In  so  far  as  it  is  itself  \ 
a  positive,  physical  reality,  a  growth  of  living  cells,  it  has  its  own 
nature,  its  natural  tendency,  its  development  towards  an  end  in 
accordance  with  biological  laws :  in  all  of  which  it  verifies  the 
definition  of  ontological  goodness.  But  the  existence  of  such  a 

1 "  Malum  est  defectus  boni  quod  natum  est  et  debet  haberi," — ST.  THOMAS, 
Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  49,  art.  i,  c. 
2  ibid. 


1 84  ONTOLOGY 

growth  in  the  stomach  is  pathological,  i.e.  a  disease  of  the  stomach, 
a  prevention  of  the  natural,  normal  function  of  the  stomach,  a 
failure  of  the  latter' s  adaptation  to  its  end,  and  hence  an  evil  for 
the  stomach.  Lying,  too,  is  an  evil,  a  moral  evil  of  man  as  a 
moral  subject.  But  this  does  not  mean  that  the  whole  physical 
process  of  thinking,  judging,  speaking,  whereby  a  man  lies,  is 
itself  a  positive  evil  entity.  The  thinking  is  itself  good  as  a 
physical  act.  So  is  the  speaking  in  itself  good  as  a  physical  act 
Whatever  of  positive  reality  there  is  in  the  whole  process  is  good, 
ontologically  good.  But  there  is  a  want  of  conformity  of  the 
language  with  the  thought,  entailing  a  privation  or  failure  of 
adaptation  of  the  man  as  a  moral  subject  with  his  end,  with  his 
real  good ;  and  in  this  failure  of  adaptation,  this  privation  of 
goodness,  lies  the  moral  evil  of  lying. 

Evil,  then,  has  a  material  or  subjective  cause,  viz.  some 
positive,  actual  reality,  which  is  good  in  so  far  forth  as  it  is 
actual,  but  which  is  evil,  or  wanting  in  something  due  to  it,  in 
so  far  as  the  privation  which  we  have  called  evil  affects  it. 

But  evil  has  no  formal  cause :  formally  it  is  not  a  reality 
but  a  privation:  "evil  has  no  formal  cause,  but  is  rather  the 
privation  of  a  form >>.1 

Nor  has  evil  any  final  cause,  for  it  consists  precisely  in  the 
failure  of  a  being's  natural  tendency  towards  its  end,  in  the  want 
of  adaptation  of  a  nature  to  its  end  :  "  nor  has  evil  a  final  cause, 
but  is  rather  the  privation  of  a  being's  due  relation  to  its  natural 
end  ".2  Evil  cannot  be  the  natural  result  of  a  being's  tendency 
towards  its  end,  or  a  means  to  the  attainment  of  this  end.  For 
that  which  is  really  an  end  must  be  good,  and  a  means  derives  its 
goodness  from  the  end  to  which  it  is  a  means.  The  good,  be- 
cause it  is  an  end,  or  a  means  to  an  end,  is  desirable ;  and  so, 
too,  might  evil  be  defined  a  posteriori  as  that  which  is  the  object 
of  no  natural  tendency  or  desire,  that  from  which  all  things  are 
averse  :  malum  est  quod  nullum  ens  appetit,  vel  a  quo  omnia  aver- 
santur.  Nor  can  evil  be  itself  an  end,  or  be  as  such  desired  or 
desirable.  Real  evil  is  no  doubt  often  sought  and  desired  by 
conscious  beings,  sometimes  physical  evil,  sometimes  moral  evil. 
But  it  is  always  desired  and  embraced  as  a  good,  sub  specie  boni, 
i.e.  when  apprehended  as  here  and  now  good  in  the  sense  of 

1 "  Causam  formalem  malum  non  habet,  sed  est  magis  privatio  formae." — St. 
THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  49,  art.  i,  c. 

2  "  Nee  causam  finalem  habet  malum,  sed  magis  est  privatio  ordinis  ad  debitum 
finem." — ibid. 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  185 

gratifying,  pleasure-giving,  bonum  delectabile.  This  is  possible 
because  pleasure,  especially  organic,  sensible  pleasure,  as  distinct 
from  the  state  of  real  well-being  which  characterizes  true  happi- 
ness, is  not  the  exclusive  concomitant  of  seeking  and  possessing  a 
real  good :  it  often  accompanies  the  seeking  and  possessing  of  a 
merely  apparent  good  :  and  in  such  cases  it  is  itself  a  merely 
apparent  good,  and  in  reality  evil.  The  unfortunate  man  who 
commits  suicide  does  not  embrace  evil  as  such.  He  wrongly 
judges  death  to  be  good,  as  being  in  his  view  a  lesser  evil  than 
the  miseries  of  his  existence,  and  under  this  aspect  of  goodness 
he  embraces  death. 

Finally  we  have  to  inquire  whether  evil  has  an  efficient  cause. 
Seeing  that  it  is  not  merely  a  logical  figment,  seeing  that  it 
really  affects  actual  things,  that  it  really  occurs  in  the  actual 
universe,  it  must  have  a  real  source  among  the  efficient  causes  of 
these  actual  things  that  make  up  the  universe.  It  is  undoubtedly 
due  to  the  action  of  efficient  causes,  i.e.  to  the  failure,  the  defec- 
tive action,  of  efficient  causes.  But  being  itself  something  negative, 
a  privation,  it  cannot  properly  be  said  to  have  an  "  efficient "  cause ; 
for  the  influence  of  an  efficient  cause  is  positive  action,  which  in 
turn  must  have  for  its  term  something  positive,  something  real, 
and  therefore  good.  Hence  St.  Augustine  very  properly  says 
that  evil  should  be  described  as  having  a  "  deficient"  cause  rather 
than  an  "  efficient  "  cause.1  In  other  words,  evil  is  not  the  direct, 
natural  or  normal  result  of  the  activity  of  efficient  causes  ;  for 
this  result  is  always  good.  It  must  therefore  be  always  an  indirect, 
abnormal,  accidental  consequence  of  their  activity.  Let  us  see 
how  this  can  be — 'firstly  in  regard  to  physical  evil,  then  in  re- 
gard to  moral  evil. 

In  the  action  of  physical  causes  we  may  distinguish  between 
the  operative  agencies  themselves  and  the  subjects  in  which  the 
effects  of  these  operations  are  produced.  Sometimes  the  effect 
is  wanting  in  due  perfection,  or  is  i  nother  words  imperfect, 
physically  evil,  because  of  some  defect  in  the  agencies  :  the 
statue  may  be  defective  because  the  sculptor  is  unskilled,  or  his 
instruments  bad ;  offspring  may  be  weak  or  malformed  owing  to 
some  congenital  or  accidental  weakness  or  unfitness  in  the 
parents.  Sometimes  the  evil  in  the  effect  is  traceable  not  to  the 
agents  but  to  the  materials  on  which  they  have  to  work  :  the 

1 "  Non  est  causa  efficiens  sed  deficient  mali,  quia  malum  non  est  effectio  sed 
defectio" — De  Civ.  Dei,  xii.,  7. 


1 86  ONTOLOGY 

sculptor  and  his  instruments  may  be  perfect,  but  if  there  be  a 
flaw  in  the  marble  the  statue  will  be  a  failure  ;  the  educator  may 
be  efficient,  but  if  the  pupil  be  wanting  in  aptitude  or  application 
the  results  cannot  be  "good". 

All  this,  however,  does  not  carry  us  very  far,  for  we  must 
still  inquire  why  are  the  agencies,  or  the  materials,  themselves 
defective.  Moreover,  physical  evil  sometimes  occurs  without 
any  defect  either  in  the  agencies  or  in  the  materials.  The  effect 
produced  may  be  incompatible  with  some  minor  perfection 
already  in  the  subject;  it  can  then  be  produced  only  at  the 
sacrifice  of  this  minor  perfection  :  which  sacrifice  is  for  the  sub- 
ject pro  tanto  an  evil.  It  is  in  the  natural  order  of  things  that 
the  production  of  a  new  "  form  "  or  perfection  excludes  the 
actuality  of  a  pre-existing  form  or  perfection.  All  nature  is  sub- 
ject to  change,  and  we  have  seen  that  all  change  is  ruled  by  the 
law  :  Generatio  unius  est  corruptio  alterius.  It  might  perhaps  be 
said  that  this  privation  or  supplanting  of  perfections  in  things 
by  the  actualization  in  these  things  of  incompatible  perfections, 
is  inherent  in  the  nature  of  things  and  essential  to  their  finiteness 
— at  least,  if  we  regard  the  things  not  individually  but  as  parts 
of  a  whole,  as  members  of  a  system,  as  subserving  a  general 
scheme  ; — and  that  therefore  such  privation  should  not  be  regarded 
as  physical  evil  proper,  but  rather  as  "  metaphysical  "  evil,  im- 
properly so  called.  However  we  regard  it,  it  can  have  no  other 
first  source  than  the  Will  of  the  Creator  decreeing  the  actual 
order  of  the  existing  universe.  And  the  same  must  be  said  of 
the  physical  evils  proper  that  are  incident  to  the  actual  order  of 
things.  These  evils  are  "  accidental  "  when  considered  in  re- 
lation to  the  individual  natures  of  the  created  agencies  and 
materials.  They  are  defects  or  failures  of  natural  tendencies : 
were  these  natural  tendencies  always  realized  there  would  be  no 
such  evils.  But  they  are  not  realized  ;  and  their  "  failure "  or 
"  evil "  is  not  "  accidental  "  in  regard  to  God ;  for  God  has 
willed  and  created  these  agencies  with  natural  tendencies  which 
He  has  destined  to  be  fulfilled  not  always  and  in  every  detail, 
but  in  such  measure  as  will  secure  the  actual  order  of  the  uni- 
verse and  show  forth  His  perfections  in  the  finite  degree  in 
which  He  has  freely  chosen  to  manifest  these  perfections.  The 
world  He  has  chosen  to  create  is  not  the  best  absolutely  possible  : 
there  are  physical  evils  in  it ;  but  it  is  the  best  for  the  exact 
purpose  for  which  He  created  it, 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  187 

There  is  also  moral  evil  in  the  universe.  In  comparison  with 
moral  evil,  the  physical  defects  in  God's  creation — physical  pain 
and  suffering,  material  privations  and  hardships,  decay  and  death 
of  living  things — are  not  properly  evils  at  all.  At  least  they  are 
not  evils  in  the  same  profound  sense  as  the  deliberate  turning 
away  of  the  moral  agent  from  God,  his  Last  End  and  Ultimate 
Good,  is  an  evil.  For  the  physical  evils  incident  to  individual 
beings  in  the  universe  can  be  not  only  foreseen  by  God  but 
accepted  and  approved,  so  to  speak,  by  His  Will,  as  subserving 
the  realization  of  the  total  physical  good  which  He  wills  in  the 
universe ;  and  as  subordinate  to,  and  instrumental  in  the 
realization  of,  the  moral  good  of  mankind  :  for  it  is  obvious  that 
in  the  all-wise  designs  of  Providence  physical  evils  such  as  pain, 
suffering,  poverty,  hunger,  etc.,  may  be  the  means  of  realizing 
moral  goodness.  But  moral  evil,  on  the  contrary,  or,  in  the 
language  of  Christian  ethics,  Sin — the  conscious  and  deliberate 
rejection,  by  the  free  agent,  of  God  who  is  his  true  good — 
though  necessarily  foreseen  by  God  in  the  universe  He  has 
actually  chosen  to  create,  and  therefore  necessarily  permitted  by 
the  Will  of  God  consequently  on  this  foresight,  cannot  have 
been  and  cannot  be  intended  or  approved  by  Him.  Having 
created  man  an  intelligent  and  free  being,  God  could  not  will  or 
decree  the  revolt  of  the  latter  from  Himself.  He  loves  essentially 
His  own  Infinite  Goodness  :  were  He  to  identify  His  Will  with 
that  of  the  sinning  creature  He  would  at  the  same  time  be  turn- 
ing away  from  His  Goodness  :  which  is  a  contradiction  in  terms. 
God,  therefore,  does  not  will  moral  evil.  Nevertheless  He  per- 
mits it :  otherwise  it  would  not  occur,  for  nothing  can  happen 
"against  His  will".  He  has  permitted  it  by  freely  choosing  to 
create  this  actual  universe  of  rational  and  free  creatures,  foreseeing 
that  they  would  sin.  He  could  have  created  instead  a  universe 
of  such  beings,  in  which  there  would  be  no  moral  evil  :  for  He 
is  omnipotent.  Into  the  secrets  of  His  election  it  is  not  given  to 
finite  minds  to  penetrate.  Acknowledging  His  Infinite  Power, 
Wisdom  and  Goodness,  realizing  at  the  same  time  the  finiteness 
of  our  faculties,  we  see  how  rational  it  is  to  bow  down  our  minds 
with  St.  Paul  and  to  exclaim  in  admiration  :  "  O,  the  depth  of  the 
riches  of  the  wisdom  and  of  the  knowledge  of  God  !  How  incom- 
prehensible are  His  judgments,  and  how  unsearchable  His  ways  ! "  1 

1  "  O,  altitude  divitiarum  sapientiae,  et  scientiae  Dei !  Quam  incomprehensibilia 
sunt  judicia  ejus,  et  investigabiles  viae  ejus  !  " — Rom.  xi.,  33. 


1 88  ONTOLOGY 

If  it  be  objected  that  God's  permission  of  moral  evil  in  the 
universe  is  really  the  cause  of  this  evil,  and  makes  God  Himself 
responsible  for  sin  and  its  consequences,  a  satisfactory  answer  is 
not  far  to  seek.  It  is  absolutely  incompatible  with  God's  Infinite 
Sanctity  that  He  be  responsible  for  sin  and  its  consequences. 
For  these  the  free  will  of  the  creature  is  alone  responsible.  The 
creation  of  intelligent  beings,  endowed  with  the  power  freely  to 
love,  honour  and  serve  God,  is  the  most  marvellous  of  all  God's 
works.  Free  will  is  the  noblest  endowment  of  a  creature  of  God, 
as  it  is  also  the  most  mysterious.  Man,  who  by  his  intelligence 
has  the  power  to  know  God  as  his  Supreme  Good,  has  by  his 
will  the  power  freely  to  tend  towards  God  and  attain  to  the 
possession  of  God  as  his  Last  End.  In  so  far  as  man  sins,  i.e. 
knowingly,  deliberately,  and  freely  violates  the  tendency  of  his 
nature  towards  God  by  turning  away  from  Him,  he  and  he  alone 
is  responsible  for  the  consequences,  because  he  has  the  power  to 
accomplish  what  he  knows  to  be  God's  design  in  his  regard, 
and  to  be  his  true  destiny  and  path  to  happiness — viz.  that  he 
tend  towards  union  with  God  and  the  possession  of  God— 
and  he  deliberately  fails  to  make  use  of  this  power.  Such 
failure  and  its  consequences  are,  therefore,  his  own  ;  they  leave 
absolutely  untouched  and  unassailed  the  Infinite  Goodness  and 
Benevolence  of  God's  eternal  design  in  his  regard. 

In  scholastic  form,  the  objection  is  proposed  and  answered 
in  this  way  :  "  The  cause  of  a  cause  is  the  cause  of  the  latter's 
effects ;  but  God  is  the  cause  of  man,  and  sin  is  the  latter's 
effect  ;  therefore  God  is  the  cause  of  sin".  "That  the  cause  of 
a  non-free  cause  is  the  cause  of  the  latter's  effects,  we  admit. 
That  the  cause  of  zfree  cause  is  the  cause  of  the  latter's  effects, 
at  least  in  the  sense  of  permitting,  without  intending  and  being 
thereby  responsible  for  them,  we  also  admit  ;  always  in  the 
sense  of  intending  and  being  responsible  for  them,  we  deny. 
*Y\\&  positive  effects  of  a  created  free  cause,  those  which  the  latter 
by  nature  is  intended  to  produce,  are  attributable  to  the  first 
cause  or  creator  of  the  free  cause,  and  the  first  cause  is  responsible 
for  them.  Thefat7ures  of  the  created  free  cause  to  produce  its 
natural  and  intended  effects,  are  not  due  to  the  first  cause  ;  they 
are  not  intended  by,  nor  attributable  to,  the  first  cause  ;  nor  is 
the  latter  responsible  for  them  :  they  are  failures  of  the  free 
cause,  and  of  him  alone  ;  though  they  are  of  course  foreseen  and 
permitted  by  the  first  cause  or  creator  of  the  latter.  The  minor 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  189 

premiss  of  the  objection  we  may  admit — noting,  however,  that 
sin  is  not  properly  called  an  effect,  but  rather,  like  all  evil,  a 
failure  of  some  cause  to  produce  its  connatural  effect :  it  is  a 
defect,  a  deficiency,  a  privation  of  some  effect,  of  some  positive 
perfection,  which  the  cause  ought  naturally  to  have  produced. 
The  conclusion  of  the  objection  we  distinguish,  according  to  our 
analysis  of  the  major  premiss  :  God  is  the  cause  of  sin  in  the 
proper  sense  of  intending  it,  willing  it,  and  producing  it  positively, 
and  being  thereby  responsible  for  it,  we  deny ;  God  is  the  cause 
of  sin  in  the  improper  sense  of  merely  foreseeing  and  permitting 
it  as  incidental  to  the  universe  He  has  actually  willed  and  decreed 
to  create,  as  occurring  in  this  universe  by  the  deliberate  failure 
of  free  creatures  to  conform  themselves  to  His  primary  benevolent 
intention  in  their  regard,  we  may  grant.  And  this  Divine  per- 
mission of  moral  evil  cannot  be  shown  to  be  incompatible  with 
any  attribute  of  the  Divinity." 

In  the  preceding  paragraphs  we  have  barely  outlined  the 
principles  on  which  the  philosophy  of  theism  meets  the  problem 
of  evil  in  the  universe.  We  have  made  assumptions  which  it  is 
the  proper  province  of  Natural  Theology  to  establish,  and  to  that 
department  also  we  must  refer  the  student  for  a  fuller  treatment 
of  the  whole  problem. 

It  has  been  sometimes  said  that  the  fact  of  evil  in  the  uni- 
verse is  one  of  the  greatest  difficulties  against  the  philosophy  of 
Theism.  If  this  be  taken  as  an  insinuation  that  the  fact  of  evil 
can  be  better  explained — or  even  as  well  explained — on  the 
assumptions  of  Pantheism,  Monism,  Manicheism,  or  any  other 
philosophy  besides  Theism,  it  is  false.  If  it  means  simply  that  in 
accounting  for  evil — whether  on  principles  of  Theism  or  of  any 
other  philosophy — we  are  forced  to  raise  some  ultimate  questions 
in  the  face  of  which  we  must  admit  that  we  have  come  upon 
depths  of  mystery  which  the  plummet  of  our  finite  intellects 
cannot  hope  to  fathom,  in  this  sense  indeed  the  assertion  may  be 
admitted.  As  we  have  already  hinted,  even  with  the  light  of  the 
Christian  Revelation  to  aid  the  natural  light  of  reason,  there  are 
questions  about  the  existence  and  causes  of  evil  which  we  may 
indeed  ask,  but  which  we  cannot  adequately  answer.  And 
obviously  this  is  no  reflection  on  Theism  ;  while  in  the  latter 
system  we  have  a  more  intelligible  and  more  satisfactory  analysis 
of  the  problem  than  in  any  other  philosophy. 

Among  the  ancient    Greek  philosophers  we  find   "  matter " 


190  ONTOLOGY 


identified  with  "  vacuum  "  or  "  empty  space  "  (TO  /cevov)  and 
this  again  with  "  nothingness  "  or  non-being  (TO  /JLTJ  bv).  Now 
the  concept  of  evil  is  the  concept  of  something  negative  —  a 
privation  of  goodness,  of  being  or  reality.  Thus  the  notion  of 
evil  came  to  be  associated  with  the  notion  of  matter.  But  the 
latter  notion  is  not  really  negative  :  it  is  that  of  a  formless, 
chaotic,  disorderly  material.  When,  therefore,  the  Manicheans 
attributed  a  positive  reality  to  evil  —  conceiving  it  as  the  principle 
of  all  disorder,  strife,  discord  —  they  naturally  regarded  all  matter 
as  the  expression  of  the  Evil  Principle,  in  opposition  to  soul  or 
spirit  as  the  expression  of  the  Good  Principle.  The  Manichean 
philosophy  of  Evil,  a  product  of  the  early  Christian  centuries,  has 
been  perhaps  the  most  notable  alternative  or  rival  system 
encountered  by  the  theistic  philosophy  of  Evil  ;  for,  notwith- 
standing the  fantastic  character  of  its  conceptions  Manicheism  has 
reappeared  and  reasserted  itself  repeatedly  in  after  ages,  notably 
in  the  Middle  Ages.  Its  prevalence  has  probably  been  due 
partly  to  the  concreteness  of  its  conceptions  and  partly  to  a 
certain  analogy  which  they  bear  towards  the  conception  of  Satan 
and  the  fallen  angels  in  Christian  theology.  In  both  cases  there 
is  the  idea  of  conflict,  strife,  active  and  irreconcilable  opposition, 
between  the  powers  of  good  and  the  powers  of  evil.  But  there 
the  analogy  ends.  While  in  Christian  theology  the  powers  of 
evil  are  presented  as  essentially  subject  to  the  Divine  Omnipo- 
tence, in  Manicheism  the  Evil  Principle^  the  Summum  Malum,  is 
presented  as  a  supreme,  self-existent  principle,  essentially  inde- 
pendent of,  as  well  as  antagonistic  to,  the  Divine  Being,  the 
Summum  Bonum.  Since  there  is  evil  in  the  world,  and  since 
good  cannot  be  the  cause  of  evil  —  so  the  Manicheans  argue  — 
there  must  be  an  essentially  Evil  First  Principle  which  is  the 
primary  source  of  all  the  evil  in  the  universe,  just  as  there  is 
an  essentially  Good  First  Principle  which  is  the  source  of  all 
its  good.  Everything  in  the  world  —  and  especially  man  himself, 
composed  of  matter  and  spirit  —  is  the  expression  and  the  theatre 
of  the  essential  conflict  which  is  being  ever  waged  between  the 
Good  and  the  Evil  Principle.  Everywhere  throughout  the  uni- 
verse we  find  this  dualism  :  between  spirit  and  matter,  light  and 
darkness,  order  and  disorder,  etc. 

From  all  that  has  been  said  in  the  preceding  paragraphs  re- 
garding the  nature  and  causes  of  good  and  evil  the  errors  of  the 
Manichean  system  will  be  apparent.  Its  fundamental  error  is  the 


REALITY  AND  THE  GOOD  191 

conception  of  evil  as  a  positive  entity.  Evil  is  not  a  positive 
entity  but  a  privation.  And  this  being  so,  its  occurrence  does 
not  demand  a  positive  efficient  cause.  It  can  be  explained  and 
accounted  for  by  deficiency  or  failure  in  causes  that  are  good  in 
so  far  forth  as  they  are  operative,  but  which  have  not  all  the 
goodness  their  nature  demands.  And  we  have  seen  how  this 
failure  of  created  causes  is  permitted  by  the  First  Cause,  and  is 
not  incompatible  with  His  Infinite  Goodness. 

Besides,  the  Manichean  conception  of  an  intrinsically  evil 
cause,  a  cause  that  could  produce  only  evil,  is  a  contradiction  in 
terms.  The  operation  of  an  efficient  cause  must  have  a  positive 
term  :  in  so  far  as  the  term  is  positive  it  is  good  :  and  therefore 
its  cause  cannot  have  been  totally  evil,  but  must  have  been  in 
some  degree  good.  The  crucial  point  in  the  whole  debate  is 
this,  that  we  cannot  conceive  evil  as  a  positive  entity.  By  doing 
so  we  render  reality  unintelligible  ;  we  destroy  the  fundamental 
ground  of  any  possible  distinction  between  good  and  evil,  thus 
rendering  both  alike  inconceivable.  Each  is  correlative  to  the 
other  ;  we  cannot  understand  the  one  without  the  other.  If, 
therefore,  goodness  is  an  aspect  of  real  being,  and  identical  with 
reality,  evil  must  be  a  negation  of  reality,  and  cannot  be  made 
intelligible  otherwise. 

Finally,  the  Manichean  conception  of  two  Supreme,  Self- 
Existent,  Independent  First  Principles  is  obviously  self-contra- 
dictory. As  is  shown  in  Natural  Theology,  Being  that  is 
absolutely  Supreme,  Self-Existent  and  Necessary,  must  by  Its 
very  nature  be  unique  :  there  could  not  be  two  such  Beings. 


CHAPTER  VII. 
REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL. 

53.  THE  CONCEPT  OF  THE  BEAUTIFUL  FROM  THE  STAND- 
POINT OF  EXPERIENCE. — Truth  and  Goodness  characterize  re- 
ality as  related  to  intellect  and  to  will.  Intimately  connected 
with  these  notions  is  that  of  the  beautiful?-  which  we  must  now 
briefly  analyse.  The  fine  arts  have  for  their  common  object  the 
expression  of  the  beautiful ;  and  the  department  of  philosophy 
which  studies  these,  the  philosophy  of  the  beautiful,  is  generally 
described  as  Esthetics? 

Like  the  terms  "  true  "  and  "  good,"  the  term  "  beautiful  " 
(/ca\6v  ;  pulchrum,  beau,  schb'n,  etc.)  is  familiar  to  all.  To  reach 
a  definition  of  it  let  us  question  experience.  What  do  men 
commonly  mean  when,  face  to  face  with  some  object  or  event, 
they  say  "That  is  beautiful"?  They  give  expression  to  this 
sentiment  in  the  presence  of  a  natural  object  such  as  a  landscape 
revealing  mountain  and  valley,  lake  and  river  and  plain  and 
woodland,  glowing  in  the  golden  glow  of  the  setting  sun ;  or  in 
contemplating  some  work  of  art — painting,  sculpture,  architecture, 
music  :  the  Sistine  Madonna ,  the  Moses  of  Michael  Angelo,  the 
Cathedral  of  Notre  Dame,  a  symphony  of  Beethoven ;  or  some 
literary  masterpiece :  Shakespeare's  Macbeth,  or  Dante's  Divina 
Commedia,  or  Newman's  Apologia,  or  Kickham's  Knocknagow. 
There  are  other  things  the  sight  of  which  arouses  no  such  senti- 
ment, but  leaves  us  indifferent ;  and  others  again,  the  sight  of 
which  arouses  a  contrary  sentiment,  to  which  we  give  expression 
by  designating  them  as  "commonplace,"  "  vulgar,"  "ugly  ".  The 
sentiment  in  question  is  one  of  pleasure  and  approval,  or  of  dis- 
pleasure and  disapproval. 

Hence  the  first  fact  to  note  is  that  the  beautiful  pleases  us, 

1  Connected  with  the  transcendental  notion  of  unity  is  another  concept,  that  of 
order,  which  will  be  more  fully  examined  when  we  come  to  treat  of  causes. 

2  BAUMGARTEN,  a  German  philosopher  of  the  eighteenth  century,  was  the  first 
to  use  the  term  Aesthetica  in  this  sense. 

192 


REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL  193 

affects  us  agreeably ',  while  the  commonplace  or  the  ugly  leaves  us 
indifferent  or  displeases  us,  affects  us  disagreeably. 

But  the  good  pleases  us  and  affects  us  agreeably.  Is  the 
beautiful,  then,  identical  with  the  good  ?  No  ;  the  really  beauti- 
ful is  indeed  always  good  ;  but  not  everything  that  is  good  is 
beautiful ;  nor  is  the  pleasure  aroused  by  the  good  identical  with 
that  aroused  by  the  beautiful.  Whatever  gratifies  the  lower 
sense  appetites  and  causes  organic  pleasure  is  good — bonum 
delectabile — but  is  not  deemed  beautiful.  Eating  and  drinking, 
resting  and  sleeping,  indulging  the  senses  of  touch,  taste  and 
smell,  are  indeed  pleasure-giving,  but  they  have  no  association 
with  the  beautiful.  Again,  the  deformed  child  may  be  the  object  of 
the  mother's  special  love.  But  the  pleasure  thus  derived  from 
the  good,  as  the  object  of  appetite,  desire,  delight,  is  not  esthetic 
pleasure.  If  we  examine  the  latter,  the  pleasure  caused  by  the 
beautiful,  we  shall  find  that  it  is  invariably  a  pleasure  peculiar  to 
knowledge,  to  apprehension,  perception,  imagination,  contempla- 
tion. Hence  in  the  domain  of  the  senses  we  designate  as 
"  beautiful "  only  what  can  be  apprehended  by  the  two  higher 
senses,  seeing  and  hearing,  which  approximate  most  closely  to 
intellect,  and  which,  through  the  imagination,  furnish  data  for 
contemplation  to  the  intellect.1  This  brings  us  to  St.  Thomas's 
definition  :  Pulchra  sunt  qua  visa  placent :  those  things  are  beauti- 
ful whose  vision  pleases  us, — where  vision  is  to  be  understood  in 
the  wide  sense  of  apprehension,  contemplation.2  The  owner  of 
a  beautiful  demesne,  or  of  an  art  treasure,  may  derive  pleasure 

1 "  Dicendum  est  quod  pulchrum  est  idem  bono  sola  ratione  differens.  Cum 
enim  bonum  sit  quod  omnia  appetunt,  de  ratione  boni  est,  quod  in  eo  quietetur 
appetitus  ;  sed  ad  rationem  pulchri  attinet  quod  in  ejus  aspectu  sen  cognitione  quietetur 
appetitus ;  unde  et  illi  sensus  praecipue  respiciunt  pulchrum,  qui  maxime  cognoscitivi 
sunt,  scilicet  visus  et  auditus  rationi  deservientes  ;  dicimus  enim  pulchra  visibilia  et 
pulchros  sonos ;  in  sensibilibus  autem  aliorum  sensuum  non  utimur  nomine  pul- 
chritudinis ;  non  enim  dicimus  pulchros  sapores,  aut  odores." — ST.  THOMAS, 
Suntma  Theol.,  i».  ii«.,  q.  27,  art.  i,  ad.  3. 

2  "  Ad  rationem  pulchri  pertinet,  quod  in  ejus  aspectu  seu  cognitione  quietetur 
appetitus  .  .  .  ita  quod  pulchrum  dicatur  id,  cujus  ipsa  apprehensio  placet." — ST. 
THOMAS,  Summa  Theol. ,  i*.  ii*.,  q.  27,  art.  i,  ad.  3.  And  the  Angelic  Doctor 
justifies  the  extended  use  of  the  term  vision  :  "  De  aliquo  nomine  dupliciter  convenit 
loqui,  uno  modo  secundum  ejus  primam  impositionem,  alio  modo  secundum  usum 
nominis,  sicut  patet  in  nomine  visionis,  quod  primo  impositum  est  ad  significandum 
actum  sensus  visus  ;  sed  propter  dignitatem  et  certitudinem  hujus  sensus  extensum 
est  hoc  nomen,  secundum  usum  loquentium,  ad  omnem  cognitionem  aliorum  sen- 
suum ;  dicimus  enim :  Vide  quomodo  sapit,  vel  quomodo  redolet,  vel  quomodo  est 
calidum  ;  et  ulterius  etiam  ad  cognitionem  intellectus,  secundum  illud  Matt,  v,  8 ; 
Beati  mundi  corde  quoniam  ipsi  Deum  videbunt." — i.,  q.  67,  art.  i,  c, 


194  ONTOLOGY 

from  his  sense  of  proprietorship;  but  this  is  distinct  from  the 
esthetic  pleasure  that  may  be  derived  by  others,  no  less  than  by 
himself,  from  the  mere  contemplation  of  those  objects.  Esthetic 
pleasure  is  disinterested  :  it  springs  from  the  mere  contemplation 
of  an  object  as  beautiful ;  whereas  the  pleasure  that  springs  from 
the  object  as  good  is  an  interested  pleasure,  a  pleasure  of 
possession.  No  doubt  the  beautiful  is  really  identical  with  the 
good,  though  logically  distinct  from  the  latter.1  The  orderliness 
which  we  shall  see  to  be  the  chief  objective  factor  of  beauty,  is 
itself  a  perfection  of  the  object,  and  as  such  is  good  and  desirable. 
Hence  the  beautiful  can  be  an  object  of  interested  desire,  but 
only  under  the  aspect  of  goodness.  Under  the  aspect  of  beauty 
the  object  can  excite  only  the  disinterested  esthetic  pleasure  of 
contemplation. 

But  if  esthetic  pleasure  is  derived  from  contemplation,  is  not 
this  identifying  the  beautiful  with  the  true,  and  supplanting  art 
by  science  ?  Again  the  consequence  is  inadmissible  ;  for  not 
every  pleasure  peculiar  to  knowledge  is  esthetic.  There  is  a 
pleasure  in  seeking  and  discovering  truth,  the  pleasure  which 
gratifies  the  scholar  and  the  scientist :  the  pleasure  of  the  philo- 
logist in  tracing  roots  and  paradigms,  of  the  chemist  in  analysing 
unsavoury  materials,  of  the  anatomist  in  exploring  the  structure 
of  organisms  post  mortem.  But  these  things  are  not  "  beautiful  ". 
The  really  beautiful  is  indeed  always  true,  but  it  cannot  well  be 
maintained  that  all  truths  are  beautiful.  That  two  and  two  are 
four  is  a  truth,  but  in  what  intelligible  sense  could  it  be  said  to 
be  beautiful  ? 

But  besides  the  scientific  pleasure  of  seeking  and  discovering 
truth,  there  is  the  pleasure  which  comes  from  contemplating  the 
object  known.  The  aim  of  the  scientist  or  scholar  is  to  discover 
truth ;  that  of  the  artist  is,  through  knowledge  to  derive  com- 
placency from  contemplating  the  thing  known.  The  scientist  or 
scholar  may  be  also  an  artist,  or  vice  versa ;  but  the  scientist's 
pleasure  proper  lies  exclusively  in  discovering  truth,  whereas 
that  of  the  artist  lies  in  contemplating  something  apprehended, 
imagined,  conceived.  The  artist  is  not  concerned  as  to  whether 
what  he  apprehends  is  real  or  imaginary,  certain  or  conjectural, 

1 "  Pulchrum  et  bonum  in  subjecto  quidem  sunt  idem,  quia  super  eandem  rern 
fundantur,  scilicet  super  formam,  et  propter  hoc  bonum  laudatur  ut  pulchrum  :  sed 
ratione  differunt :  nam  bonum  proprie  respicit  appetitum :  .  .  .  et  ideo  habet 
rationem  finis.  .  .  .  Pulchrum  autem  respicit  vim  cognoscitivam :  pulchra  enim 
dicuntur  quse  visa  placent." — ST,  THOMAS,  SummA  TheoL,  i.,  q.  5,  art.  4,  ad.  I, 


REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL  195 

but  only  as  to  whether  or  how  far  the  contemplation  of  it  will 
arouse  emotions  of  pleasure,  admiration,  enthusiasm ;  while  the 
scientist's  supreme  concern  is  to  know  things,  to  see  them  as 
they  are.  The  beautiful,  then,  is  always  true,  either  as  actual  or 
as  ideal ;  but  the  true  is  beautiful  only  when  it  so  reveals  itself 
as  to  arouse  in  us  the  desire  to  see  or  hear  it,  to  consider  it,  to 
dwell  and  rest  in  the  contemplation  of  it. 

Let  us  accept,  then,  the  a  posteriori  definition  of  the  beautiful 
as  that  which  it  is  pleasing  to  contemplate  ;  and  before  inquiring 
what  precisely  is  it,  on  the  side  of  the  object,  that  makes  the 
latter  agreeable  to  contemplate,  let  us  examine  the  subjective 
factors  and  conditions  of  esthetic  experience. 

54.  THE  ESTHETIC  SENTIMENT.  APPREHENSION  OF  THE 
BEAUTIFUL. — We  have  seen  that  both  the  appetitive  and  the 
cognitive  faculties  are  involved  in  the  experience  of  the  beautiful. 
Contemplation  implies  cognition ;  while  the  feeling  of  pleasure, 
complacency,  satisfaction,  delight,  indicates  the  operation  of 
appetite  or  will.  Now  the  notion  of  the  beautiful,  like  all  our 
notions,  has  its  origin  in  sense  experience;  but  it  is  itself 
suprasensible  for  it  is  reached  by  abstraction,  and  this  is  above 
the  power  of  sense  faculties.  While  the  senses  and  imagination 
apprehend  beautiful  objects  the  intellect  attains  to  that  which 
makes  these  objects  beautiful,  to  the  ratio pulchri  that  is  in  them. 
No  doubt,  the  perception  or  imagination  of  beautiful  things,  in 
nature  or  in  art,  produces  as  its  natural  concomitant,  a  feeling  of 
sensible  pleasure.  To  hear  sweet  music,  to  gaze  on  the  brilliant 
variety  of  colours  in  a  gorgeous  pageant,  to  inhale  delicious 
perfumes,  to  taste  savoury  dishes — all  such  experiences  gratify 
the  senses.  But  the  feeling  of  such  sensible  pleasure  is  quite 
distinct  from  the  esthetic  enjoyment  which  accompanies  the 
apprehension  of  the  beautiful ;  though  it  is  very  often  confounded 
with  the  latter.  Such  sentient  states  of  agreeable  feeling  are 
mainly  passive,  organic,  physiological;  while  esthetic  enjoyment, 
the  appreciation  of  the  beautiful,  is  eminently  active.  It  implies 
the  operation  of  a  suprasensible  faculty,  the  intelligence;  it 
accompanies  the  reaction  of  the  latter  faculty  to  some  appropriate 
objective  stimulus  of  the  suprasensible,  intelligible  order,  to 
some  "  idea"  embodied  in  the  object  of  sense.1 

The   error    of  confounding    esthetic    enjoyment  with    mere 

1  £/.  DE  WULF,  La  Valeur  esthetique  de  la  maralitt  dans  Vart,  pp.  28-9, 

13* 


196  ONTOLOGY 

organic  sense  pleasure  is  characteristic  of  all  sensist  and 
materialist  philosophies.  A  feeling  of  sensible  gratification 
always,  no  doubt,  accompanies  our  apprehension  and  enjoyment 
of  the  beautiful ;  for  just  as  man  is  not  a  merely  sentient  being 
so  neither  is  he  a  pure  intelligence.  Beauty  reaches  him  through 
the  senses ;  in  order  that  an  object  be  beautiful  for  him,  in  order 
that  the  contemplation  of  it  may  please  him,  it  must  be  in 
harmony  with  his  whole  human  nature,  which  is  both  sentient 
and  intelligent ;  it  must,  therefore,  be  agreeable  to  the  senses 
and  imagination  as  well  as  to  the  intellect.  "  There  is  no 
painting,"  writes  M.  Brunetiere,1  "but  should  be  above  all  a  joy 
to  the  eye!  no  music  but  should  be  a  delight  for  the  ear!" 
Otherwise  we  shall  not  apprehend  in  it  the  order,  perfection, 
harmony,  adaptation  to  human  nature,  whereby  we  pronounce 
an  object  beautiful  and  rejoice  in  the  contemplation  of  it.  And 
it  is  this  intellectual  activity  that  is  properly  esthetic.  "What 
makes  us  consider  a  colour  beautiful,"  writes  Bossuet,2  is  the 
secret  judgment  we  pronounce  upon  its  adaptation  to  the  eye 
which  it  pleases.  Beautiful  sounds,  songs,  cadences,  have  a 
similar  adaptation  to  the  ear.  To  apprehend  this  adaptation 
promptly  and  accurately  is  what  is  described  as  having  a  good 
ear,  though  properly  speaking  this  judgment  should  be  attributed 
to  the  intellect." 

According  to  some  the  esthetic  sentiment,  the  appreciation 
and  enjoyment  of  the  beautiful,  is  an  exclusively  subjective  ex- 
perience, an  emotional  state  which  has  all  its  sources  within  the 
conscious  subject,  and  which  has  no  real,  extramental  correlative 
in  things.  According  to  others  beauty  is  already  in  the  extra- 
mental  reality  independently  of  any  subjective  conditions,  and 
has  no  mental  factors  in  its  constitution  as  an  object  of 
experience.  Both  of  these  extreme  views  are  erroneous. 
Esthetic  pleasure,  like  all  pleasure,  is  the  natural  concomitant  of 
the  full,  orderly,  normal  exercise  of  the  subject's  conscious 
activities.  These  activities  are  called  forth  by,  and  exercised 
upon,  some  object.  For  esthetic  pleasure  there  must  be  in  the 
object  something  the  contemplation  of  which  will  elicit  such 
harmonious  exercise  of  the  faculties.  Esthetic  pleasure,  there- 
fore, cannot  be  purely  subjective:  there  must  be  an  objective 
factor  in  its  realization.  But  on  the  other  hand  this  objective 

1  L'Art  et  la  Morale,  p.  29. 

2  DC  la  connaissance  de  Diw<  &  de  sai-meme,  ch.  i.,  §  8, 


REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL  197 

factor  cannot  provoke  esthetic  enjoyment  independently  of  the 
dispositions  of  the  subject.  It  must  be  in  harmony  with  those 
dispositions — cognitive,  appetitive,  affective,  emotional,  tempera- 
mental— in  order  to  evoke  such  a  mental  view  of  the  object 
that  the  contemplation  of  the  latter  will  cause  esthetic  pleasure. 
And  it  is  precisely  because  these  dispositions,  which  are  so 
variable  from  one  individual  to  another,  tinge  and  colour  the 
mental  view,  while  this  in  turn  determines  the  quality  of  the 
esthetic  judgment  and  feeling,  that  people  disagree  and  dispute 
interminably  about  questions  of  beauty  in  art  and  nature. 
Herein  beauty  differs  from  truth.  No  doubt  people  dispute 
about  the  latter  also;  but  at  all  events  they  recognize  its 
objective  character  and  the  propriety  of  an  appeal  to  the  inde- 
pendent, impersonal  standard  of  evidence.  Not  so,  however, 
in  regard  to  beauty :  De  gustibus  non  est  disputandum :  there  is 
no  disputing  about  tastes.  The  perception  of  beauty,  the  judg- 
ment that  something  is  or  is  not  beautiful,  is  the  product  of  an 
act  of  taste,  i.e.  of  the  individual's  intelligence  affected  by 
numerous  concrete  personal  dispositions  both  of  the  sentient  and 
of  the  spiritual  order,  not  only  cognitive  and  appetitive  but 
temperamental  and  emotional.  Moreover,  besides  this  variety 
in  subjective  dispositions,  we  have  to  bear  in  mind  the  effects  of 
artistic  culture,  of  educating  the  taste.  The  eye  and  the  ear, 
which  are  the  two  main  channels  of  data  for  the  intellect,  can  be 
made  by  training  more  delicate  and  exacting,  so  that  the  same 
level  of  esthetic  appreciation  can  be  maintained  only  by  a 
constantly  increasing  measure  of  artistic  stimulation.  Finally, 
apart  from  all  that  a  beautiful  object  directly  conveys  to  us  for 
contemplation,  there  is  something  more  which  it  may  indirectly 
suggest :  it  arouses  a  distinct  activity  of  the  imagination  whereby 
we  fill  up,  in  our  own  individual  degree  and  according  to  our 
own  interpretation,  what  has  not  been  actually  supplied  in  it  by 
nature  or  art. 

All  those  influences  account  sufficiently  for  the  subjectivity 
and  variability  of  the  esthetic  sentiment,  for  diversity  of  artistic 
tastes  among  individuals,  for  the  transitions  of  fashion  in  art 
from  epoch  to  epoch  and  from  race  to  race.  But  it  must  not 
be  concluded  that  the  subjective  factors  in  the  constitution  of 
the  beautiful  are  wholly  changeable.  Since  human  nature  is 
fundamentally  the  same  in  all  men  there  ought  to  be  a  fund  of 
esthetic  judgments  and  pleasures  common  to  all ;  there  ought  to 


198  ONTOLOGY 

be  in  nature  and  in  art  some  things  which  are  recognized  and 
enjoyed  as  beautiful  by  all.  And  there  are  such.  In  matters 
of  detail  the  maxim  holds  :  De  gustibus  non  disputandum.  But 
there  are  fundamental  esthetic  judgments  for  which  it  does  not 
hold.  Since  men  have  a  common  nature,  and  since,  as  we  shall 
see  presently,  there  are  recognizable  and  stable  objective  factors 
to  determine  esthetic  judgments,  there  is  a  legitimate  foundation 
on  which  to  discuss  and  establish  some  esthetic  canons  of  universal 
validity. 

55.  OBJECTIVE  FACTORS  IN  THE  CONSTITUTION  OF  THE 
BEAUTIFUL. — "Ask  the  artist,"  writes  St.  Augustine,1  " whether 
beautiful  things  are  beautiful  because  they  please  us,  or  rather 
please  us  because  they  are  beautiful,  and  he  will  reply  unhesitat- 
ingly that  they  please  us  because  they  are  beautiful."  What, 
then  is  it  that  makes  them  beautiful,  and  so  causes  the  esthetic 
pleasure  we  experience  in  contemplating  them  ?  In  order  that  an 
object  produce  pleasure  of  any  sort  in  a  conscious  being  it  must 
evoke  the  exercise  of  this  being's  faculties;  for  the  conscious 
condition  which  we  describe  as  pleasure  is  always  a  reflex  of 
conscious  activity.  Furthermore,  this  activity  must  be/&//  and 
intense  and  well-ordered:  if  it  be  excessive  or  defective,  if  it  be 
ill-regulated,  wrongly  distributed  among  the  faculties,  it  will  not 
have  pleasure  for  its  reflex,  but  either  indifference  or  pain. 

Hence  the  object  which  evokes  the  esthetic  pleasure  of  con- 
templation must  in  the  first  place  be  complete  or  perfect  of  its 
kind  (46).  The  truncated  statue,  the  stunted  oak,  the  deformed 
animal,  the  crippled  human  being,  are  not  beautiful.  They  are 
wanting  in  the  integrity  due  to  their  nature. 

But  this  is  not  enough.  To  be  beautiful,  the  object  must  in 
the  second  place  have  a  certain  largeness  or  amplitude,  a  certain 
greatness  or  power,  whereby  it  can  act  energetically  on  our  cog- 
nitive faculties  and  stimulate  them  to  vigorous  action.  The  little, 
the  trifling,  the  commonplace,  the  insignificant,  evokes  no  feeling 
of  admiration.  The  sight  of  a  small  pasture-field  leaves  us  in- 
different ;  but  the  vision  of  vast  expanses  of  meadow  and  corn- 
field and  woodland  exhilarates  us.  A  collection  of  petty  hillocks 
is  uninteresting,  while  the  towering  snow-clad  Alps  are  magnifi- 
cent. The  multiplication  table  elicits  no  emotion ;  but  the 
triumphant  discovery  and  proof  of  some  new  truth  in  science, 
some  far-reaching  theorem  that  opens  up  new  vistas  of  research 

1  De  Vera  Religione,  c.  32. 


REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL  199 

or  sheds  a  new  light  on  long  familiar  facts,  may  fill  the  mind  with 
ecstasies  of  pure  esthetic  enjoyment.1  There  is  no  moral  beauty 
in  helping  up  a  child  that  has  stumbled  and  fallen  in  the  mud, 
but  there  is  in  risking  one's  life  to  save  the  child  from  burning 
or  drowning,  There  must,  then,  be  in  the  object  a  certain  large- 
ness which  will  secure  energy  of  appeal  to  our  cognitive  faculties  ; 
but  this  energy  must  not  be  excessive,  it  must  not  dazzle,  it 
must  be  in  proportion  to  the  capacity  of  our  faculties.2 

A  third  requisite  for  beauty  is  that  the  object  be  in  itself 
duly  proportioned,  orderly,  well  arranged.  Order  generally  may 
be  defined  as  right  or  proper  arrangement.  We  can  see  in 
things  a  twofold  order,  dynamic,  or  that  of  subordination,  and  static, 
or  that  of  co-ordination  :  the  right  arrangement  of  means  towards 
ends,  and  the  right  arrangement  of  parts  in  a  whole,  or  members 
in  a  system.  The  former  indicates  the  influence  of final  causes 
and  expresses  primarily  the  goodness  of  things.  The  latter  is  de- 
termined by  the  formal  causes  of  things  and  expresses  primarily 
their  beauty.  The  order  essential  to  beauty  consists  in  this,  that 
the  manifold  and  distinct  things  or  acts  which  contribute  to  it 
must  form  one  whole.  Hence  order  has  been  defined  as  unity  in 
variety :  unitas  in  varietate  ;  variety  being  the  material  cause,  and 
unity  the  formal  cause,  of  order.  But  we  can  apprehend  unity 
in  a  variety  of  things  only  on  condition  that  they  are  arranged, 
i.e.  that  they  show  forth  clearly  to  the  mind  a  set  of  mutual  re- 
lations which  can  be  easily  grasped.  Why  is  it  that  things 
mutually  related  to  one  another  in  one  way  make  up  what  we 
declare  to  be  a  chaotic  jumble,  while  if  related  in  another  way  we 
declare  them  to  be  orderly?  Because  unless  these  relations  pre- 
sent themselves  in  a  certain  way  they  will  fail  to  unify  the  mani- 
fold for  us.  We  have  an  intellectual  intuition  of  the  numerical 
series  ;  and  of  proportion,  which  is  equality  of  numerical  relations. 
In  the  domains  of  magnitude  and  multitude  the  mind  naturally 
seeks  to  detect  these  proportions.  So  also  in  the  domains  of 
sensible  qualities,  such  as  sounds  and  colours,  we  have  an 
analogous  intuition  of  a  qualitative  series,  and  we  naturally  try  to 

1 C/.  POINCARE,  Conference  sur  les  rapports  de  V analyse  et  de  la  physique  mathe- 
matique. — apud  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  §  274,  pp.  546-7  n. 

2  When  the  object  so  excels  in  greatness  or  grandeur  as  to  exceed  more  or  less 
our  capacity  to  realize  it  we  speak  of  it  as  sublime.  The  sublime  calls  forth 
emotions  of  self-abasement,  reverence,  and  even  fear.  If  an  object  possessing  the 
other  requisites  of  beauty  is  wanting  in  due  magnitude,  we  describe  it  as  pretty  or 
elegant.  The  terms  grace,  graceful,  apply  especially  to  gait,  gesture,  movement. 


200  ONTOLOGY 

detect  harmony -,  which  is  the  gradation  of  qualitative  relations  in 
this  series.  The  detection  of  proportion  and  harmony  in  a  variety 
of  things  pleases  us,  because  we  are  thus  enabled  to  grasp 
the  manifold  as  exhibiting  unity ;  while  the  absence  of  these 
elements  leaves  us  with  the  dissatisfied  feeling  of  something 
wanting.  Whether  this  be  because  order  in  things  is  the  expres- 
sion of  an  intelligent  will,  of  purpose  and  design,  and  therefore 
calls  forth  our  intelligent  and  volitional  activity,  with  its  conse- 
quent and  connatural  feeling  of  satisfaction,  we  do  not  inquire 
here.  But  certain  it  is  that  order  is  essential  to  beauty,  that 
esthetic  pleasure  springs  only  from  the  contemplation  of  pro- 
portion and  harmony,  which  give  unity  to  variety.1  And  the 
explanation  of  this  is  not  far  to  seek.  For  the  full  and  vigorous 
exercise  of  contemplative  activity  we  need  objective  variety. 
Whatever  lacks  variety,  and  stimulates  us  in  one  uniform  manner, 
becomes  monotonous  and  causes  ennui.  While  on  the  other 
hand  mere  multiplicity  distracts  the  mind,  disperses  and  weakens 
attention,  and  begets  fatigue.  We  must,  therefore,  have  variety, 
but  variety  combined  with  the  unity  that  will  concentrate  and 
sustain  attention,  and  thus  call  forth  the  highest  and  keenest 
energy  of  intellectual  activity.  Hence  the  function  of  rhythm  in 
music,  poetry  and  oratory;  of  composition  and  perspective  in 
painting ;  of  design  in  architecture. 

The  more  perfect  the  relations  are  which  constitute  order, 
the  more  clearly  will  the  unity  of  the  object  shine  forth  ;  hence 
the  more  fully  and  easily  will  it  be  grasped,  and  the  more  intense 
the  esthetic  pleasure  of  contemplating  it. 

St.  Thomas  thus  sums  up  the  objective  conditions  of  the 
beautiful :  integrity  or  perfection,  proportion  or  harmony,  and 
clarity  or  splendour.'2' 

1  On  this  point  all  the  great  philosophers  are  unanimous.     For  Plato,  beauty 
whether  of  soul  or  of  body,  whether  of  animate  or  of  inanimate  things,  results  not  from 
chance,  but  from  order,  rectitude,  art :  ov\  OVTODS  ef/oj  /caAAia-ra  irapayiyverai  aAAat 
Ta£et  /cat  opQ6r^Ti  /col  rexvVi  ^Tt*  ^ndffrcf  cwroSe'SoTai  avrwv  (Plato,  Gorg.  5o6D).    Aris- 
totle places  beauty  in  grandeur  and  order :  Ti>  yap  KaXbv  eV  peyeQei  KO.\  rd£ei  effri 
(Poetics,  ch.  viii.,  n.  8).     ToG  5e  KO.\OV  /j-eyiffTa  eiS^rd^is  Kal  <rv^frp(aKa\  rb  &piffp.tvov 
(Metaph.,  xii.,  ch.  iii.,  n.  n).     "  Nihil,"  writes  St.  Augustine,  "  est  ordinatum  quod 
non  sit  pulchrum."    "  Pulchra,"  says  St.  Thomas,  "  dicuntur  quae  visa  placent ;  unde 
pulchrum  in  debita  proportione  consistit "  (Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  5,  art.  4,  ad.  i). 

2  "  Ad  pulchritudinem  tria  requiruntur  ;  primo  quidem  integritas  sive  perfectio  ; 
quae  enim  diminuta  sunt,  hoc  ipso  turpia  sunt ;  et  debita  proportio  sive  consonantia ; 
et  iterum  claritas." — Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  39,  art.  8,  c.    Elsewhere  he  omits  integrity, 
supposing  it  implied  in  order:  "  ad  rationem  pulchri  sive  decori  concurrit  et  claritas 
et  debita  proportio  ".     And  elsewhere  again  he  omits  clarity,  this  being  a  necessary 
effect  of  order :  "  pulchrum  in  debita  proportione  consistit  ". 


REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL  201 

56.  SOME  DEFINITIONS  OF  THE  BEAUTIFUL. — An  object  is 
beautiful  when  its  contemplation  pleases  us ;  and  this  takes 
place  when  the  object,  complete  and  entire  in  itself,  possesses 
that  order,  harmony,  proportion  of  parts,  which  will  call  forth 
the  full  and  vigorous  exercise  of  our  cognitive  activity.  All  this 
amounts  to  saying  that  the  beauty  of  a  thing  is  the  revelation  or 
manifestation  of  its  natural  perfection}-  Perfection  is  thus  the 
foundation  of  beauty  ;  the  showing  forth  of  this  perfection  is  what 
constitutes  beauty  formally.  Every  real  being  has  a  nature 
which  constitutes  it,  and  activities  whereby  it  tends  to  realize 
the  purpose  of  its  existence.  Now  the  perfection  of  any  nature 
is  manifested  by  the  proportion  of  its  constitutive  parts  and  by 
the  harmony  of  all  its  activities.  Hence  we  see  that  order  is 
essential  to  beauty  because  order  shows  forth  the  perfection  of 
the  beautiful.  An  object  is  beautiful  in  the  degree  in  which  the 
proportion  of  its  parts  and  the  harmony  of  its  activities  show 
forth  the  perfection  of  its  nature. 

Thus,  starting  with  the  subjective,  a  posteriori  definition  of 
beauty  from  its  effect :  beauty  is  that  whose  contemplation  pleases 
us — we  have  passed  to  the  objective  and  natural  definition  of 
beauty  by  its  properties  :  beauty  is  the  evident  integrity,  order, 
proportion  and  harmony,  of  an  object — and  thence  to  what  we  may 
call  the  a  priori  or  synthetic  definition,  which  emphasizes  the 
perfection  revealed  by  the  static  and  dynamic  order  of  the  thing : 
the  beauty  of  an  object  is  the  manifestation  of  its  natural  perfection 
by  the  proportion  of  its  parts  and  the  harmony  of  its  activities? 

A  few  samples  of  the  many  definitions  that  have  been  set  forth  by 
various  authors  will  not  be  without  interest.  Vallet 3  defines  beauty  as  the 
splendour  of  perfection.  Other  authors  define  it  as  the  splendour  of  order. 
These  definitions  sacrifice  clearness  to  brevity.  Beauty  is  the  splendour  of  the 
true.  This  definition,  commonly  attributed  to  Plato,  but  without  reason,  is 
inadequate  and  ambiguous.  Cousin 4  defines  beauty  as  unity  in  variety. 
This  leaves  out  an  essential  element,  the  clarity  or  clear  manifestation  of 
order.  Kant  defines  beauty  as  the  power  an  object  possesses  of  giving  free 
play  to  the  imagination  without  transgressing  the  laws  of  the  understanding? 

1  By  "  natural  perfection  "  is  meant  the  perfection  which  a  nature  acquires  by 
the  realization  of  its  end  (5)  :  TeAcioi/  5e  rb  €xov  r£\os  (Aristotle). 

2  This   definition  coincides  with  that  found  in  a  medieval  scholastic  treatise 
De  Pulchro  et  Bono,  attributed  to  St.  Thomas  or  Albertus  Magnas  :  "  Ratio  pulchri 
in  universal!  consistit  in  resplendentia  formae  super  partes  materiae  proportionatas, 
vel  super  diversas  vires  vel  actiones."     C/.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  p.  554. 

3L'Idee  du  beau  dans  la  philosophic  de  S.  Thomas  d'Aquin,  p.  2. 

4  Du  Vrai,  du  Beau  et  du  Bien,  viie  Ie9on. 

5  Kritik  der  Urtheilskraft,  Th.  i.,  Abschn.  i,  B.  i,  passim. 


202  ONTOLOGY 

This  definition  emphasizes  the  necessary  harmony  of  the  beautiful  with  our 
cognitive  faculties,  and  the  fact  that  the  esthetic  sentiment  is  not  capricious 
but  subject  to  the  laws  of  the  understanding.  It  is,  however,  inadequate, 
in  as  much  as  it  omits  all  reference  to  the  objective  factors  of  beauty. 

57.  CLASSIFICATIONS.  THE  BEAUTIFUL  IN  NATURE.— All 
real  beauty  is  either  natural  or  artificial.  Natural  beauty  is  that 
which  characterizes  what  we  call  the  "works  of  Nature"  or 
the  "  works  of  God  ".  Artificial  beauty  is  the  beauty  of  "  works 
of  art". 

Again,  just  as  we  can  distinguish  the  real  beauty  of  the  latter 
from  the  ideal  beauty  which  the  human  artist  conceives  in  his 
mind  as  its  archetype  and  exemplar  cause,  so,  too,  we  can  distin- 
guish between  the  real  beauty  of  natural  things  and  the  ideal 
beauty  of  their  uncreated  archetypes  in  the  Mind  of  the  Divine 
Artist. 

We  know  that  the  beauty  of  the  human  artist's  ideal  is 
superior  to,  and  never  fully  realized  in,  that  of  the  actually 
achieved  product  of  his  art.  Is  the  same  true  of  the  natural 
beauty  of  God's  works  ?  That  the  works  of  God  in  general  are 
beautiful  cannot  be  denied;  His  Wisdom  "spreads  beauty 
abroad  "  throughout  His  works  ;  He  arranges  all  things  according 
to  weight  and  number  and  measure :  cum  pondere,  numero  et 
mensura ;  His  Providence  disposes  all  things  strongly  and 
sweetly :  fortiter  et  suaviter.  But  while  creatures,  by  revealing 
their  own  beauty,  reflect  the  Uncreated  beauty  of  God  in  the 
precise  degree  which  He  has  willed  from  all  eternity,  it  cannot 
be  said  that  they  all  realize  the  beauty  of  their  Divine 
Exemplars  according  to  His  primary  purpose  and  decree.  Since 
there  is  physical  and  moral  evil  in  the  universe,  since  there  are 
beings  which  fail  to  realize  their  ends,  to  attain  to  the  perfection 
of  their  natures,  it  follows  that  these  beings  are  not  beautiful. 
In  so  far  forth  as  they  have  real  being,  and  the  goodness  or  per- 
fection which  is  identical  with  their  reality,  it  may  be  admitted 
that  all  real  beings  wet  fundamentally  beautiful;  for  goodness  or 
perfection  is  the  foundation  of  beauty.1  But  in  so  far  as  they  fail 
to  realize  the  perfection  due  to  their  natures  they  lack  even  the 
foundation  of  beauty.  Furthermore,  in  order  that  a  thing 
which  has  the  full  perfection  due  to  its  nature  ^formally  beauti- 
ful, it  must  actually  show  forth  by  the  clearness  of  its  proportions 

1 "  Omnis  corporea  creatura  .  .  .  bonum  est  infimum,  et  in  genere  suo  pulchrum 
quoniam  forma  et  specie  continetur." — ST.  AUGUSTINE,  De  Vera  Relig.,  c.  20. 


REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL  203 

and  the  harmony  of  its  activities  the  fulness  of  its  natural  perfec- 
tions. But  there  is  no  need  to  prove  that  this  is  not  universally 
verified  in  nature — or  in  art  either.  And  hence  we  must  infer 
that  formal  beauty  is  not  a  transcendental  attribute  of  reality.1 

Real  beauty  may  be  further  divided  into  material  or  sensible 
or  physical,  and  intellectual  or  spiritual.  The  former  reveals  itself 
to  hearing,  seeing  and  imagination  ;  the  latter  can  be  apprehended 
only  by  intellect ;  but  intellect  depends  for  all  its  objects  on  the 
data  of  the  imagination.  The  beauty  of  spiritual  realities  is  of 
course  of  a  higher,  nobler  and  more  excellent  order  than  that  of 
the  realities  of  sense.  The  spiritual  beauty  which  falls  directly 
within  human  experience  is  that  of  the  human  spirit  itself;  from 
the  soul  and  its  experiences  we  can  rise  to  an  apprehension — 
analogical  and  inadequate — of  the  Beauty  of  the  Infinite  Being. 
In  the  soul  itself  we  can  distinguish  two  sources  of  beauty  :  what 
we  may  call  its  natural  endowments  such  as  intellect  and  will, 
and  its  moral  dispositions,  its  perfections  and  excellences  as  a 
free,  intelligent,  moral  agent — its  virtues.  Beauty  of  soul,  es- 
pecially the  moral  beauty  of  the  virtuous  soul,  is  incomparably 
more  precious  than  beauty  of  body.  The  latter,  of  course,  like  all 
real  beauty  in  God's  creation,  has  its  proper  dignity  as  an  expres- 
sion and  revelation,  however  faint  and  inadequate,  of  the  Un- 
created Beauty  of  the  Deity.  But  inasmuch  as  it  is  so  inferior 
to  the  moral  beauty  proper  to  man,  in  itself  so  frail  and  evanescent, 
in  its  influence  on  human  passions  so  dangerous  to  virtue,  we 
can  understand  why  in  the  Proverbs  of  Solomon  it  is  proclaimed 
to  be  vain  and  deceitful  in  contrast  with  the  moral  beauty  of 
fearing  the  Lord  :  Fallax  gratia,  et  vana  est  pulchritudo  ;  mulier 
timens  dominum  ipsa  laudabitur? 

58.  THE  BEAUTIFUL  IN  ART.    SCOPE  AND  FUNCTION  OF  THE 

1  At  the  same  time  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  many  of  the  judgments  by 
which  things  are  pronounced  "  ugly  "  or  "  commonplace  "  are  erroneous.     This  is 
partly  because  they  are  based  on  first  and  superficial  sense  -impressions :  beauty 
must  be  apprehended  and  judged  by  the  intellect,  and  by  the  intellect  "  informed  " 
with  genuine  knowledge  ;  to  the  eye  of  enlightened  intelligence  tnere  are  beauties 
of  structure  and  organization  in  the  beetle  or  the  tadpole  as  well  as  in  the  peacock 
or  the  spaniel.     It   is  partly,  too,  because  we  unconsciously  or  semi-consciously 
apply  standards  of  human  beauty  to  beings  that  are  merely  animal:  "To  know 
really  whether  there  are  ugly  monkeys  we  should  have  to  consult  a  monkey ;  for 
the  beauty  we  unconsciously  look  for,  and  certainly  do  not  find,  in  the  monkey,  is 
the  beauty  of  the  human  form ;  and  when  we  declare  the  monkey  ugly  what  we 
really  mean  is  that  it  would  be  ugly  if  it  were  a  human  being  ;  which  is  undeniable." 
— SULLY-PRUDHOMME,  L'Expression  dans  les  beaux  arts,  p.  104. 

2  Proverbs,  xxxi.  30. 


204  ONTOLOGY 

FINE  ARTS. — The  expression  of  beauty  is  the  aim  of  the  fine  arts. 
Art  in  general  is  "  the  proper  conception  of  a  work  to  be  accom- 
plished "  :  "  ars  nihil  aliud  est  quam  recta  ratio  aliquorum  operum 
faciendorum".1  While  the  mechanical  arts  aim  at  the  production 
of  things  useful,  the  fine  arts  aim  at  the  production  of  things 
beautiful,  i.e.  of  works  which  by  their  order,  symmetry,  harmony, 
splendour,  etc.,  will  give  such  apt  expression  to  human  ideals  of 
natural  beauty  as  to  elicit  esthetic  enjoyment  in  the  highest  pos- 
sible degree.  The  artist,  then,  must  be  a  faithful  student  and 
admirer  of  all  natural  beauty ;  not  indeed  to  aim  at  exact  repro- 
duction or  imitation  of  the  latter;  but  to  draw  therefrom  his 
inspiration  and  ideals.  Even  the  most  beautiful  things  of  nature 
express  only  inadequately  the  ideal  beauty  which  the  human 
mind  may  gather  from  the  study  of  them.  This  ideal  is  what  the 
artist  is  ever  struggling  to  express,  with  the  ever-present  and 
tormenting  consciousness  that  the  achievement  of  his  highest  effort 
will  fall  immeasurably  short  of  giving  adequate  expression  to  it. 

If  each  of  the  things  of  nature  were  so  wholly  simple  and  in- 
telligible as  to  present  the  same  ideal  type  of  beauty  to  all,  and 
leave  no  room  for  individual  differences  of  interpretation,  there 
would  be  no  variety  in  the  products  of  artistic  genius,  except 
indeed  what  would  result  from  perfect  or  imperfect  execution. 
But  the  things  of  nature  are  complex,  and  in  part  at  least  enig- 
matical ;  they  present  different  aspects  to  different  minds  and 
suggest  a  variety  of  interpretations  ;  they  leave  large  scope  to  the 
play  of  the  imagination  both  as  to  conception  of  the  ideal 
itself  and  as  to  the  arrangement  and  manipulation  of  the  sensible 
materials  in  which  the  ideal  is  to  find  expression.  By  means  of 
these  two  functions,  conception  and  expression,  the  genius  of  the 
artist  seeks  to  interpret  and  realize  for  us  ideal  types  of  natural 
beauty. 

The  qualities  of  a  work  of  art,  the  conditions  it  must  fulfil, 
are  those  already  enumerated  in  regard  to  beauty  generally.  It 
must  have  unity,  order,  proportion  of  parts ;  it  must  be  true  to 
nature,  not  in  the  sense  of  a  mere  copy,  but  in  the  sense  of 
drawing  its  inspiration  from  nature,  and  so  helping  us  to  under- 
stand and  appreciate  the  beauties  of  nature ;  it  must  display  a 
power  and  clearness  of  expression  adjusted  to  the  capacity  of  the 
normal  mind. 

We  may  add — as  indicating  the  connexion  of  art  with  morality 

1  ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  ia,  iiae,  q.  57,  art.  3,  c. 


REALITY  AND  THE  BEAUTIFUL  205 

—that  the  work  of  art  must  not  be  such  as  to  excite  disapproval 
or  cause  pain  by  shocking  any  normal  faculty,  or  running  counter 
to  any  fundamental  belief,  sympathy,  sentiment  or  feeling,  of  the 
human  mind.  The  contemplation  of  the  really  beautiful,  whether 
in  nature  or  in  art,  ought  per  se  to  have  an  elevating,  ennobling, 
refining  influence  on  the  mind.  But  the  beautiful  is  not  the 
good ;  nor  does  the  cultivation  of  the  fine  arts  necessarily  enrich 
the  mind  morally.  From  the  ethical  point  of  view  art  is  one  of 
those  indifferent  things  which  the  will  can  make  morally  good  or 
morally  evil.  Since  man  is  a  moral  being,  no  human  interest  can 
fall  outside  the  moral  sphere,  or  claim  independence  of  the  moral 
law ;  and  art  is  a  human  interest.  Neither  the  creator,  nor  the 
critic,  nor  the  student  of  a  work  of  art  can  claim  that  the  latter, 
simply  because  it  is  a  work  of  art,  is  neither  morally  good  nor 
morally  bad  ;  or  that  he  in  his  special  relation  to  it  is  independent 
of  the  moral  law. 

Under  the  specious  plea  that  science  in  seeking  truth  is 
neither  positively  moral  nor  positively  immoral,  but  abstracts 
altogether  from  the  quality  of  morality,  it  is  sometimes  claimed 
that,  a  pari}  art  in  its  pursuit  of  the  beautifdl  should  be  held  to 
abstract  from  moral  distinctions  and  have  no  concern  for  moral 
good  or  evil.  But  in  the  first  place,  though  science  as  such  seeks 
simply  the  true,  and  in  this  sense  abstracts  from  the  good  and 
the  evil,  still  the  man  of  science  both  in  acquiring  and  communi- 
cating truth  is  bound  by  the  moral  law  :  he  may  not,  under  the 
plea  that  he  is  learning  or  teaching  truth,  do  anything  morally 
wrong,  anything  that  will  forfeit  or  endanger  moral  rectitude, 
whether  in  himself  or  in  others.  And  in  the  second  place,  owing 
to  the  different  relations  of  truth  and  beauty  to  moral  goodness, 
we  must  deny  the  parity  on  which  the  argument'  rests.  Truth 
appeals  to  the  reason  alone ;  beauty  appeals  to  the  senses,  the 
heart,  the  will,  the  passions  and  emotions  :  "  Pulchrum  trahit  ad 
se  desiderium  ".  The  scientist  expresses  truth  in  abstract  laws, 
definitions  and  formulas  :  a  law  of  chemistry  will  help  the  farmer 
to  fertilize  the  soil,  or  the  anarchist  to  assassinate  sovereigns. 
But  the  artist  expresses  beauty  in  concrete  forms  calculated  to 
provoke  emotions  of  esthetic  enjoyment  from  the  contemplation 
of  them.  Now  there  are  other  pleasure-giving  emotions,  sensual 
and  carnal  emotions,  the  indiscriminate  excitement  and  unbridled 
indulgence  of  which  the  moral  law  condemns  as  evil ;  and  if  a 
work  of  art  be  of  such  a  kind  that  it  is  directly  calculated  to 


2o6  ONTOLOGY 

excite  them,  the  artist  stands  condemned  by  the  moral  law,  and 
that  even  though  his  aim  may  have  been  to  give  expression  to 
beauty  and  call  forth  esthetic  enjoyment  merely.  If  the  prepon- 
derating influence  of  the  artist's  work  on  the  normal  human 
individual  be  a  solicitation  of  the  latter's  nature  towards  what  is 
evil,  what  is  opposed  to  his  real  perfection,  his  moral  progress, 
his  last  end,  then  that  artist's  work  is  not  a  work  of  art  or  truly 
beautiful.  The  net  result  of  its  appeal  being  evil  and  unhealthy, 
it  cannot  be  itself  a  thing  of  beauty. 

"  Art  for  art's  sake  "  is  a  cry  that  is  now  no  longer  novel.  Taken  liter- 
ally it  is  unmeaning,  for  art  is  a  means  to  an  end — the  expression  of  the 
beautiful  \  and  a  means  as  such  cannot  be  "  for  its  own  sake  ".  But  it  may 
signify  that  art  should  subserve  no  extrinsic  purpose,  professional  or  utili- 
tarian ;  that  it  should  be  disinterested  ;  that  the  artist  must  aim  at  the  concep- 
tion and  expression  of  the  beautiful  through  a  disinterested  admiration  and 
enthusiasm  for  the  beautiful.  In  this  sense  the  formula  expresses  a  principle 
which  is  absolutely  true,  and  which  asserts  the  noble  mission  of  the  artist  to 
mankind.  But  the  formula  is  also  commonly  understood  to  claim  the  emanci- 
pation of  the  artist  from  the  bonds  of  morality,  and  his  freedom  to  conceive 
and  express  beauty  in  whatever  forms  he  pleases,  whether  these  may  aid  men 
to  virtue  or  solicit  them  to  vice.  This  is  the  pernicious  error  to  which  we 
have  just  referred.  And  we  may  now  add  that  this  erroneous  contention  is 
not  only  ethically  but  also  artistically  unsound.  For  surely  art  ought  to  be 
based  on  truth :  the  artist  should  understand  human  nature,  to  which  his 
work  appeals  :  he  should  not  regard  as  truly  beautiful  a  work  the  contempla- 
tion of  which  will  produce  a  discord  in  the  soul,  which  will  disturb  the  right 
order  of  the  soul's  activities,  which  will  solicit  the  lower  faculties  to  revolt 
against  the  higher  ;  and  this  is  what  takes  place  when  the  artist  ignores  moral 
rectitude  in  the  pursuit  of  his  art  :  by  despising  the  former  he  is  false  to  the 
latter.  He  fails  to  realize  that  the  work  of  art  must  be  judged  not  merely  in 
relation  to  the  total  amount  of  pleasure  it  may  cause  in  those  who  contemplate 
it,  but  also  in  relation  to  the  quality  of  this  pleasure ;  and  not  merely  in 
relation  to  esthetic  pleasure,  but  in  relation  to  the  total  effect,  the  whole  con- 
crete influence  of  the  work  on  all  the  mental  faculties.  He  fails  to  see  that 
if  this  total  influence  is  evil,  the  work  that  causes  it  cannot  be  good  nor  there- 
fore really  beautiful. 

Are  we  to  conclude,  then,  that  the  artist  is  bound  to  aim  positively  and 
always  at  producing  a  good  moral  effect  through  his  work  ?  By  no  means. 
Esthetic  pleasure  is,  as  we  have  said,  indifferent.  The  pursuit  of  it,  through 
the  conception  and  expression  of  the  beautiful,  is  the  proper  and  intrinsic  end 
of  the  fine  arts,  and  is  in  itself  legitimate  so  long  as  it  does  not  run  counter  to 
the  moral  law.  It  has  no  need  to  run  counter  to  the  moral  law,  nor  can  it  do 
so  without  defeating  its  own  end.  Outside  its  proper  limits  art  ceases  to  be 
art ;  within  its  proper  limits  it  has  a  noble  and  elevating  mission  ;  and  it  can 
serve  indirectly  but  powerfully  the  interests  of  truth  and  goodness  by  helping 
men  to  substitute  for  the  lower  and  grosser  pleasures  of  sense  the  higher  and 
purer  esthetic  pleasures  which  issue  from  the  disinterested  contemplation  of 
the  beautiful. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE  CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT. 

59.  THE  CONCEPTION  OF  ULTIMATE  CATEGORIES. — Having 
examined  so  far  the  notion  of  real  being  itself,  which  is  the 
proper  subject-matter  of  ontology,  and  those  widest  or  trans- 
cendental notions  which  are  coextensive  with  that  of  reality, 
we  must  next  inquire  into  the  various  modes  in  which  we  find 
real  being  expressed,  determined,  actualized,  as  it  falls  within 
our  experience.  In  other  words,  we  must  examine  the  highest 
categories  of  being,  the  suprema  genera  entis.  Considered  from 
the  point  of  view  of  the  logical  arrangement  of  our  concepts, 
each  of  these  categories  reveals  itself  as  a  primary  and  immedi- 
ate limitation  of  the  extension  of  the  transcendental  concept  of 
real  being  itself.  Each  is  ultimately  distinct  from  the  others 
in  the  sense  that  no  two  of  them  can  be  brought  under  any 
other  as  a  genus,  nor  can  we  discover  any  intermediate  notion 
between  any  one  of  them  and  the  notion  of  being  itself.  The 
latter  notion  is  not  properly  a  genus  of  which  they  would  be 
species,  nor  can  it  be  predicated  univocally  of  any  two  or  more 
of  them  (2).  Each  is  itself  an  ultimate  genus,  &  genus  supremum. 

By  using  these  notions  as  predicates  of  our  judgments  we  are 
enabled  to  interpret  things,  to  obtain  a  genuine  if  inadequate 
insight  into  reality ;  for  we  assume  as  established  in  the  Theory 
of  Knowledge  that  all  our  universal  concepts  have  real  and  ob- 
jective validity,  that  they  give  us  real  knowledge  of  the  nature 
of  those  individual  things  which  form  the  data  of  our  sense 
experience.  Hence  the  study  of  the  categories,  which  is  for 
Logic  a  classification  of  our  widest  concepts,  become  for  Meta- 
physics an  inquiry  into  the  modes  which  characterize  real  being.1 
By  determining  what  these  modes  are,  by  studying  their  char- 
acteristics, by  tracing  them  through  the  data  of  experience,  we 
advance  in  our  knowledge  of  reality. 

The  most  divergent  views  have  prevailed  among  philosophers 

1C/,  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §§  70  sqq. 
207 


2o8  ONTOLOGY 

both  as  to  what  a  category  is  or  signifies,  and  as  to  what  or  how 
many  the  really  ultimate  categories  are.  Is  a  category,  such  as 
substance,  or  quality,  or  quantity,  a  mode  of  real  being  revealed 
to  the  knowing  mind,  as  most  ancient  and  medieval  philosophers 
thought,  with  Aristotle  and  St.  Thomas  ?  or  is  it  a  mental  mode 
imposed  on  reality  by  the  knowing  mind,  as  many  modern 
philosophers  have  thought,  with  Kant  and  after  him  ?  It  is  for 
the  Theory  of  Knowledge  to  examine  this  alternative  ;  nor  shall 
we  discuss  it  here  except  very  incidentally  :  for  we  shall  assume 
as  true  the  broad  affirmative  answer  to  the  first  alternative. 
That  is  to  say,  we  shall  hold  that  the  mind  is  able  to  see,  in  the 
categories  generally,  modes  of  reality ;  rejecting  the  sceptical 
conclusions  of  Kantism  in  regard  to  the  power  of  the  Speculative 
Reason,  and  the  principles  which  lead  to  such  conclusions. 

As  to  the  number  and  classification  of  the  ultimate  cate- 
gories, this  is  obviously  a  question  which  cannot  be  settled  a 
priori  by  any  such  purely  deductive  analysis  of  the  concept  of 
being  as  Hegel  seems  to  have  attempted  ;  but  only  a  posteriori^ 
i.e.  by  an  analysis  of  experience  in  its  broadest  sense  as  including 
Matter  and  Spirit,  Nature  and  Mind,  Object  and  Subject  of 
Thought,  and  even  the  Process  of  Thought  itself.  Moreover  it 
is  not  surprising  that  with  the  progress  of  philosophical  reflection, 
certain  categories  should  have  been  studied  more  deeply  at 
certain  epochs  than  ever  previously,  that  they  should  have  been 
"  discovered  "  so  to  speak,  not  of  course  in  the  sense  that  the 
human  mind  had  not  been  previously  in  possession  of  them,  but 
in  the  sense  that  because  of  closer  study  they  furnished  the  mind 
with  a  richer  and  fuller  power  of  "  explaining "  things.  It  is 
natural,  too,  that  historians  of  philosophy,  intent  on  tracing  the 
movement  of  philosophic  thought,  should  be  inclined  to  over- 
emphasize the  relativity  of  the  categories,  as  regards  their  "  ex- 
plaining "  value — their  relativity  to  the  general  mentality  of  a 
certain  epoch  or  period.1  But  there  is  danger  here  of  confound- 
ing certain  large  hypothetical  conceptions^  which  are  found  to  yield 
valuable  results  at  a  certain  stage  in  the  progress  of  the  sciences,2 
with  the  categories  proper  of  real  being.  If  the  mind  of  man  is 
of  the  same  nature  in  all  men,  if  it  contemplates  the  same  uni- 
verse, if  it  is  capable  of  reaching  truth  about  this  universe — real 
truth  which  is  immutable, — then  the  modes  of  being  which  it 

1  C/.  WINDELBAND,  History  of  Philosophy  (tr.  Tufts),  Introduction. 

2  C/.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  F.  iv.,  ch,  v, 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   209 

apprehends  in  the  universe,  and  by  conceiving  which  it  inter- 
prets the  latter,  must  be  in  the  universe  as  known,  and  must  be 
there  immutably.  Nowhere  do  we  find  this  more  clearly  illus- 
trated than  in  the  futility  of  the  numerous  attempts  of  modern 
philosophers  to  deny  the  reality  of  the  category  of  substance,  and 
to  give  an  intelligible  interpretation  of  experience  without  the 
aid  of  this  category.  We  shall  see  that  as  a  matter  of  fact  it  is 
impossible  to  deny  in  thought  the  reality  of  substance,  or  to 
think  at  all  without  it,  however  philosophers  may  have  denied 
it  in  language,  —  or  thought  that  they  denied  it  when  th'ey  only 
rejected  some  erroneous  or  indefensible  meaning  of  the  term. 

60.  THE  ARISTOTELIAN  CATEGORIES.  —  The  first  palpable 
distinction  we  observe  in  the  data  of  experience  is  that  between 
substance  and  accident.  "  We  might  naturally  ask,"  writes  Aris- 
totle,1 "  whether  what  is  signified  by  such  terms  as  walking,  sit- 
ting, feeling  well,  is  a  being  (or  reality).  .  .  .  And  we  might  be 
inclined  to  doubt  it,  for  no  single  one  of  such  acts  exists  by  itself 
(/cad'  avrb  Tre^y/co?),  no  one  of  them  is  separable  from  substance 
(pvcrLa)  ;  it  is  rather  to  him  who  walks,  or  sits,  or  feels  well,  that 
we  give  the  name  of  being.  That  which  is  a  being  in  the  primary 
meaning  of  this  term,  a  being  simply  and  absolutely,  and  not  merely 
a  being  in  a  certain  sense,  or  with  a  qualification,  is  substance— 

"  OH7T6  TO  7T/3ft)Tft)?  OV  KOI  OV  Ti  OV  dXX'  OV  aTTXto?  J]   OVdLo,  CLV  €iT)."  * 

But  manifestly,  though  substances,  or  what  in  ordinary  language 
we  call  "  persons  "  and  "  things  "  —  men,  animals,  plants,  minerals 
—are  real  beings  in  the  fullest  sense,  nevertheless  sitting,  walking, 
thinking,  willing,  and  actions  generally,  are  also  undoubtedly 
realities  ;  so  too  are  states  and  qualities  ;  and  shape,  size,  posture, 
etc.  And  yet  we  do  not  find  any  of  these  latter  actually  existing 
in  themselves  like  substances,  but  only  dependently  on  substances 
—-on  "  persons  "  or  "  things  "  that  think  or  walk  or  act,  or  are 
large  or  small,  hot  or  cold,  or  have  some  shape  or  quality.  They 
are  all  accidents,  in  contradistinction  to  substance. 

It  is  far  easier  to  distinguish  between  accidents  and  substance 
fhan  to  give  an  exhaustive  list  of  the  ultimate  and  irreducible 
classes  of  the  former.  Aristotle  enumerates  nine  :  Quantity 
(TTOO-OI/),  Quality  (TTOLOV),  Relation  (777309  TA),  Action 


1  Metaph.,  vi.,  i. 

2  Cf.  ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  90,  art.  2  :  "  Illud  proprie  dicitur  esse 
quod  ipsum  habet  esse  quasi  in  suo  esse  subsistens.     Unde  sola  substanticz  proprie 
et  vere  dicuntur  entia  ;  accidens  vero  non  habet  esse  sed  eo  aliquid  est,  et  hac  ratione 
ens  dicitur  .  .  .  accidens  dicitur  magis  entis  quant  ens." 

14 


210  ONTOLOGY 


Passion  (irdo-xeiv),  Where  (TTOV),  When  (-Trore),  Posture  (/cei(T0at), 
External  Condition  or  State  (e-^etv).  Much  has  been  said  for  and 
against  the  exhaustive  character  of  this  classification.  Scholastics 
generally  have  defended  and  adopted  it.  St.  Thomas  gives  the 
following  reasoned  analysis  of  it  :  l  Since  accidents  may  be  dis- 
tinguished by  their  relations  to  substance,  we  see  that  some  affect 
substances  intrinsically,  others  extrinsically  ;  and  in  the  former 
dase,  either  absolutely  or  relatively  :  if  relatively  we  have  the 
category  of  relation  ;  if  absolutely  we  have  either  quantity  or 
quality  according  as  the  accident  affects  the  substance  by  reason 
of  the  matter,  or  the  form,  of  the  latter.  What  affects  and  de- 
nominates a  substance  extrinsically  does  so  either  as  a  cause,  or 
as  a  measure,  or  otherwise.  If  as  a  cause,  the  substance  is  either 
suffering-  action,  or  acting  itself;  if  as  a  measure,  it  denominates 
the  subject  as  in  time,  or  in  place,  or  in  regard  to  the  relative 
position  of  its  parts,  'tis  posture,  in  the  place  which  it  occupies. 
Finally,  if  the  accident  affects  the  substance  extrinsically,  though 
not  as  cause  or  as  measure,  but  only  as  characterizing  its  external 
condition  and  immediate  surroundings,  as  when  we  describe  a 
man  as  clothed  or  armed,  we  have  the  category  >of  condition. 

It  might  be  said  that  all  this  is  more  ingenious  than  convinc- 
ing ;  but  it  is  easier  to  criticize  Aristotle's  list  than  to  suggest  a 
better  one.  In  addition  to  what  we  have  said  of  it  elsewhere,2 
a  few  remarks  will  be  sufficient  in  the  present  context. 

Some  of  the  categories,  as  being  of  lesser  importance,  we  may 
treat  incidentally  when  dealing  iwith  the  more  important  ones. 
Ubi,  Quando,  and  Situs,  together  with  the  analysis  of  our  notions 
of  Space  and  Time,  fall  naturally  into  the  general  doctrine  of 
Quantity.  The  final  category,  e^eiv,  however  interpreted,3  may 
be  referred  to  Quality,  Quantity,  or  Relation. 

A  more  serious  point  for  consideration  is  the  fact,  generally 
admitted  by  scholastics,4  that  one  and  the  same  real  accident  may 
belong  to  different  categories  if  we  regard  it  from  different  stand- 
points. Actio  andflassw  are  one  and  the  same  motus  or  change, 
regarded  in  relation  to  the  agent  and  to  the  effect,  respectively. 
Place,  in  regard  to  the  located  body  belongs  to  the  category  ubi, 
whereabouts  ;  in  regard  to  the  locating  body  it  is  an  aspect  of  the 
latter's  quantity.  Relation,  as  we  shall  see,  is  probably  not  an 

1  In  Metaph.,  L.  v.,  lect.  9  ;  cf.  In  Physic.,  L.  iii.,  lect.  5. 

2  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §§  71,  73-76.  3ibid.,  §§  74,  76. 

4  Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  268  (p.  668)  ;  MERCIER,  Logique,  §  33  (4th  edit., 
p.  99). 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   211 

entity  really  distinct  from  its  foundation — quality,  quantity,  or 
causality.  The  reason  alleged  for  this  partial  absence  of  real 
distinction  between  the  Aristotelian  categories  is  that  they  were 
thought  out  primarily  from  a  logical  point  of  view — that'of  predi- 
cation.1 And  the  reason  is  a  satisfactory  one,  for  real  distinction 
is  not  necessary  for  diversity  of  predication.  Then,  where  they 
are  not  really  distinct  entities  these  categories  are  at  least  aspects 
so  fundamentally  distinct  and  mutually  irreducible  that  each  of 
them  is  indeed  a  summum  genus  immediately  under  the  concept 
of  being  in  general. 

It  seems  a  bold  claim  to  make  for  any  scheme  of  categories, 
that  it  exhausts  all  the  known  modes  of  reality.  We  often 
experience  objects  of  thought  which  seem  at  first  sight  incapable 
of  reduction  to  any  of  Aristotle's  suprema  genera.  But  more 
mature  reflection  will  always  enable  us  to  find  a  place  for  them. 
In  order  that  any  extrinsic  denomination  of  a  substance  con- 
stitute a  category  distinct  from  those  enumerated,  it  must  affect 
the  substance  in  some  real  way  distinct  from  any  of  those  nine ; 
and  it  must  moreover  be  not  a  mere  complex  or  aggregate  of  two 
or  more  of  the  latter.  Hence  denominations  which  objects 
derive  from  the  fact  that  they  are  terms  of  mental  activities 
which  are  really  immanent,  actiones  " intentionales" — denomina- 
tions such  as  "being  known,"  "being  loved," — neither  belong  to 
the  category  of  "passio"  proper,  nor  do  they  constitute  any  dis- 
tinct category.  They  are  entia  rationis^  logical  relations.  Again, 
while  efficient  causation  resolves  itself  into  the  categories  of  actio 
and  passio,  the  causation  of  final,  formal  and  material  causes 
cannot  be  referred  to  these  categories,  but  neither  does  it  con- 
stitute any  new  category.  The  influence  of  a  final  cause  consists 
in  nothing  more  than  its  being  a  good  which  is  the  term  of 
appetite  or  desire.  The  causation  of  the  formal  cause  consists 
in  its  formally  constituting  the  effect :  it  is  always  either  a  sub- 
stantial or  an  accidental  form,  and  so  must  be  referred  to  the 
categories  of  substance,  or  quality,  or  quantity.  Similarly 
material  causality  consists  in  this  that  the  matter  is  a  partial 
constitutive  principle  of  the  composite  being ;  and  it  therefore 

1  C/.  ST.  THOMAS,  In  Metaph.,  L.  xi.,  lect.  9 :  "  Sed  sciendum  est  quod  pre- 
dicamenta  diversificantur  secundum  diversos  modos  praedicandi.  Unde  idem, 
secundum  quod  diversimode  de  diversis  praedicatur,  ad  diversa  praedicamenta  per- 
tinet.  .  .  .  Similiter  motus  secundum  quod  praedicatur  de  subjecto  in  quo  est,  con- 
stituit  praedicamentum  passionis.  Secundum  autem  quod  predicatur  de  eo  a  quo 
est,  constituit  praedicamentum  actionis." 


212  ONTOLOGY 

refers  us  to  the  category  of  substance.  It  may  be  noted,  too, 
that  the  ontological  principles  of  a  composite  being — such  as 
primal  matter  and  substantial  form — since  they  are  themselves 
not  properly  "  beings,"  but  only  "  principles  of  being,"  are  said  to 
belong  each  to  its  proper  category,  not  formally  but  only  refer- 
entially,  not  formaliter  but  only  reductive.  Finally,  the  various 
properties  that  are  assigned  to  certain  accidents  themselves  are 
either  logical  relations  (such  as  "  not  having  a  contrary "  or 
"  being  a  measure "),  or  real  relations,  or  intrinsic  modes  of  the 
accident  itself  (as  when  a  quality  is  said  to  have  a  certain 
"intensity");  but  in  all  cases  where  they  are  not  mere  logical 
entities  they  will  be  found  to  come  under  one  or  other  of  the 
Aristotelian  categories. 

The  "real  being"  which  is  thus  "determined"  into  the 
supreme  modes  or  categories  of  substance  and  accidents  is,  of 
course,  "  being "  considered  sub stantiv ally  as  essential  (whether 
possible  or  actual),  and  not  merely  being  that  is  actually  existent, 
existential  being,  in  the  participial  sense.  Furthermore,  it  is 
primarily  finite  or  created  being  that  is  so  determined.  The 
Infinite  Being  is  above  the  categories,  .ra/w-substantial.  It  is 
because  substance  is  the  most  perfect  of  the  categories,  and 
because  the  Infinite  Being  verifies  in  Himself  in  an  incompre- 
hensibly perfect  manner  all  the  perfections  of  substance,  that  we 
speak  of  Him  as  a  substance :  remembering  always  that  these 
essentially  finite  human  concepts  are  to  be  predicated  of  Him 
only  analogically  (2,  5). 

It  may  be  inquired  whether  "accident"  is  a  genus  which 
should  be  predicated  univocally  of  the  nine  Aristotelian  categories 
as  species  ?  or  is  the  concept  of  ' *  accident "  only  analogical,  so 
that  these  nine  categories  would  be  each  a  summum  genus  in  the 
strict  sense,  i.e.  an  ultimate  and  immediate  determination  of  the 
concept  of  "  being  "  itself?  We  have  seen  already  that  the  con- 
cept of  "  being  "  as  applied  to  "  substance  "  and  "  accident  "  is 
analogical  (2).  So,  too,  it  is  analogical  as  applied  to  the  various 
categories  of  accidents.  For  the  characteristic  note  of  "acci- 
dent," that  of  "  affecting,  inhering  in  "  a  subject,  can  scarcely  be 
said  to  be  verified  "  in  the  same  way,"  "  univocally,"  of  the 
various  kinds  of  accidents ;  it  is  therefore  more  probably  correct 
not  to  regard  "accident"  as  a  genus  proper,  but  to  conceive  each 
kind  of  accident  as  a  summum  genus  coming  immediately  under 
the  transcendental  concept  of  "being ". 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.   SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT  213 

61.  THE  PHENOMENIST  ATTACK  ON  THE  TRADITIONAL 
DOCTRINE  OF  SUBSTANCE. — Passing  now  to  the  question  of  the 
existence  and  nature  of  substances,  and  their  relation  to  accidents, 
we  shall  find  evidences  of  misunderstandings  to  which  many 
philosophical  errors  may  be  ascribed  at  least  in  part.  It  is  a 
fairly  common  contention  that  the  distinction  between  substance 
and  accident  is  really  a  groundless  distinction  ;  that  we  have 
experience  merely  of  transient  events  or  happenings,  internal  and 
external,  with  relations  of  coexistence  or  sequence  between  them  ; 
that  it  is  an  illusion  to  suppose,  underlying  these,  an  inert,  abiding 
basis  called  "  substance  "  ;  that  this  can  be  at  best  but  a  useless 
name  for  each  of  the  collections  of  external  and  internal  appear- 
ances which  make  up  our  total  experience  of  the  outer  world 
and  of  our  own  minds.  This  is  the  general  position  of  pheno- 
menists.  "What  do  you  know  of  substance,"  they  ask  us, 
"  except  that  it  is  an  indeterminate  and  unknown  something 
underlying  phenomena  ?  And  even  if  you  could  prove  its  ex- 
istence, what  would  it  avail  you,  since  in  its  nature  it  is,  and 
must  remain,  unknown  ?  No  doubt  the  mind  naturally  supposes 
this  c  something '  underlying  phenomena ;  but  it  is  a  mere 
mental  fiction  the  reality  of  which  cannot  be  proved,  and  the 
nature  of  which  is  admitted,  even  by  some  who  believe  in  its  real 
existence,  to  be  unknowable." 

Now  there  can  be  no  doubt  about  the  supreme  importance  of 
this  question  :  all  parties  are  pretty  generally  agreed  that  on  the 
real  or  fictitious  character  of  substance  the  very  existence  of 
genuine  metaphysics  in  the  traditional  sense  depends.  And  at 
first  sight  the  possibility  of  such  a  controversy  as  the  present 
one  seems  very  strange.  "Is  it  credible,"  asks  Mercier,1  "that 
thinkers  of  the  first  order,  like  Hume,  Mill,  Spencer,  Kant, 
Wundt,  Paulsen,  Littre,  Taine,  should  have  failed  to  recognize 
the  substantial  character  of  things,  and  of  the  Ego  or  Self? 
Must  they  not  have  seen  that  they  were  placing  themselves  in 
open  revolt  against  sound  common  sense  ?  And  on  the  other 
hand  is  it  likely  that  the  genius  of  Aristotle  could  have  been 
duped  by  the  na'fve  illusion  which  phenomenists  must  logically 
ascribe  to  him  ?  Or  that  all  those  sincere  and  earnest  teachers 
who  adopted  and  preserved  in  scholastic  philosophy  for  centuries 
the  peripatetic  distinction  between  substance  and  accidents 

1  Qntologie,  §  138  (3rd  edit.,  p.  263), 


214  ONTOLOGY 

should  have  been  all  utterly  astray  in  interpreting  an  elemen- 
tary fact  of  common  sense  ?  " 

There  must  have  been  misunderstandings,  possibly  on  both 
sides,  and  much  waste  of  argument  in  refuting  chimeras.  Let  us 
endeavour  to  find  out  what  they  are  and  how  they  gradually  arose. 

Phenomenism  has  had  its  origin  in  the  Idealism  which  con- 
fines the  human  mind  to  a  knowledge  of  its  own  states,  proclaim- 
ing the  unknowability  of  any  reality  other  than  these  ;  and  in  the 
Positivism  which  admits  the  reality  only  of  that  which  falls 
directly  within  external  and  internal  sense  experience.  Descartes 
did  not  deny  the  substantiality  of  the  soul,  nor  even  of  bodies ; 
but  his  idealist  theory  of  knowledge  rendered  suspect  all  informa- 
tion derived  by  his  deductive,  a  priori  method  of  reasoning  from 
supposed  innate  ideas,  regarding  the  nature  and  properties  of 
bodies.  Locke  rejected  the  innatism  of  Descartes,  ascribing  to 
sense  experience  a  positive  role  in  the  formation  of  our  ideas,  and 
proving  conclusively  that  we  have  no  such  intuitive  and  deduc- 
tively derived  knowledge  of  real  substances  as  Descartes  contended 
for.1  Locke  himself  did  not  deny  the  existence  of  substances,2 
any  more  than  Descartes.  But  unfortunately  he  propounded  the 
mistaken  assumption  of  Idealism,  that  the  mind  can  know  only 
its  own  states ;  and  also  the  error  of  thinking  that  because  we 
have  not  an  intuitive  insight  into  the  specific  nature  of  individual 
substances  we  can  know  nothing  at  all  through  any  channel  about 
their  nature  :  and  he  gathered  from  this  latter  error  a  general 
notion  or  definition  of  substance  which  is  a  distinct  departure 
from  what  Aristotle  and  the  medieval  scholastics  had  tradition- 
ally understood  by  substance.  For  Locke  substance  is  merely 
a  supposed,  but  unknown,  support  for  accidents.3  Setting  out 

1  Cf.  Essay  concerning  Human  Understanding,  book  iv,,  ch.  vi.,  §  n  :  "  Had  we 
such  ideas  of  substances,  as  to  know  what  real  constitutions  produce  those  sensible 
qualities  we  find  in  them,  and  how  these  qualities  flowed  from  thence,  we  could,  by 
the  specific  ideas  of  their  real  essences  in  our  own  minds,  more  certainly  find  out 
their  properties,  and  discover  what  properties  they  had  or  had  not,  than  we  can  now 
by  our  senses  :  and  to  know  the  properties  of  gold,  it  would  be  no  more  necessary 
that  gold  should  exist,  than  it  is  necessary  for  the  knowing  the  properties  of  a  triangle, 
that  the  triangle  should  exist  in  any  matter  ;  the  idea  in  our  minds  would  serve  for 
the  one  as  well  as  the  other." 

2  "  Sensation  convinces  us  that  there  are  solid,  extended  substances ;  and  re- 
flection, that  there  are  thinking  ones  :  experience  assures  us  of  the  existence  of  such 
beings."—  ibid.,  book  ii.,  ch.  xxiii.,  §  29.     Locke  protested  repeatedly  against  the 
charge  that  he  denied  the  existence  of  substances. 

3  The  notion  one  has  of  pure  substance  is  "  only  a  supposition  of  he  knows  not 
what  support  of  such  qualities,  which  are  capable  of  producing  simple  ideas  in  us  ; 


CA  TEGOR1ES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   215 

with  these  two  notions — that  all  objects  of  knowledge  must  be 
states  or  phases  of  mind,  and  that  material  substance  is  a  supposed, 
but  unknown  and  unknowable,  substratum  of  the  qualities  re- 
vealed to  our  minds  in  the  process  of  sense  perception — it  was 
easy  for  Berkeley  to  support  by  plausible  arguments  his  denial 
of  the  reality  of  any  such  things  as  material  substances.     And  it 
was  just  as  easy,   if  somewhat  more  audacious,  on  the  part  of 
Hume  to  argue  quite  logically  that  if  the  supposed  but  unknow- 
able substantial  substratum  of  external  sense  phenomena  is  illu- 
sory, so  likewise  is  the  supposed  substantial  Ego  which  is  thought 
to  underlie  and  support  the  internal  phenomena  of  consciousness. 
Hume's  rejection  of  substance  is  apparently  complete  and 
absolute,  arid  is  so  interpreted  by  many  of  his  disciples.     But  a 
thorough-going  phenomenism  is  in  reality  impossible  ;  no  philo- 
sophers have  ever  succeeded  in  thinking  out  an  intelligible  theory 
of  things  without  the  concepts  of  "  matter,"  and  "  spirit,"  and 
"  things,"  and  the  "  Ego"  or  "  Self,"  however  they  may  have  tried 
to  dispense  with  them  ;  and  these  are  concepts  of  substances. 
Hence  there  are  those  who  doubt  that  Hume  was  serious  in  his 
elaborate  reasoning  away  of  substances.     The  fact  is  that  Hume 
"  reasoned  away  "  substance  only  in  the  sense  of  an  unknowable 
substratum  of  phenomena,  and  not  in  the  sense  of  a  something 
that  exists  in  itself.1    So  far  from  denying  the  existence  of  entities 
that  exist  in  themselves,  he  seems  to  have  multiplied  these  beyond 
the  wildest  dreams  of  all   previous  philosophers  by  substantial- 
izing accidents.'2'     What  he  does  call  into  doubt  is  the  capacity  of 

which  qualities  are  commonly  called  accidents.  .  .  .  The  idea  then  we  have,  to 
which  we  give  the  general  name  substance,  being  nothing  but  the  supposed,  but 
unknown  support  of  those  qualities  we  find  existing,  which  we  imagine  cannot 
subsist,  *  sine  re  substante,'  without  something  to  support  them,  we  call  that  support 
substantial — book  ii.,ch.  xxiii.,  §  2.  In  the  following  passage  we  may  detect  the  ideal- 
istic insinuation  that  knowledge  reaches  only  to  "  ideas  "  or  mental  states,  not  to 
the  extramental  reality,  the  "  secret,  abstract  nature  of  substance  "  :  "  Whatever 
therefore  be  the  secret  abstract  nature  of  substance  in  general,  all  the  ideas  we  have 
of  particular  distinct  sorts  of  substances,  are  nothing  but  several  combinations  of 
simple  ideas,  co-existing  in  such,  though  unknown,  cause  of  their  union,  as  makes 
the  whole  subsist  of  itself".  It  belongs,  of  course,  to  the  Theory  of  Knowledge, 
not  to  the  Theory  of  Being,  to  show  how  groundless  the  idealistic  assumption  is. 

1  Inquiring  into  the  causes  of  our  "  impressions  "  and  "  ideas,"  he  admits  the 
existence  of  "bodies"  which  cause  them  and  "minds"  which  experience  them : 
"  We  may  well  ask,  What  causes  induce  us  to  believe  in  the  existence  of  body  ?  but 
'tis  vain  to  ask,  Whether  there  be  body  or  not  ?     That  is  a  point,  which  we  must 
take  for  granted  in  all  our  reasonings." — A  Treatise  on  Human  Nature,  Part  iv.,  §  ii. 

2  Of  the  definition  of  a  substance  as  something  which  may  exist  by  itself,  he  says  : 
"  this  definition  agrees  to  everything  that  can  possibly  be  conceiv'd ;  and  will  never 
serve  to  distinguish  substance  from  accident,  or  the  soul  from  its  perceptions.  .  .  . 


216  ONTOLOGY 

the  human  mind  to  attain  to  a  knowledge  of  the  specific  natures 
of  such  entities  ;  and  even  here  the  arguments  of  phenomenism 
strike  the  false  Cartesian  theory  of  knowledge,  rather  than  the 
sober  and  moderate  teachings  of  scholasticism  regarding  the 
nature  and  limitations  of  our  knowledge  of  subtances. 

62.  THE  SCHOLASTIC  VIEW  OF  OUR  KNOWLEDGE  IN  REGARD 
TO  THE  EXISTENCE  AND  NATURE  OF  SUBSTANCES. — What,  then, 
are  these  latter  teachings  ?  That  we  have  a  direct,  intellectual 
insight  into  the  specific  essence  or  nature  of  a  corporeal  substance 
such  as  gold,  similar  to  our  insight  into  the  abstract  essence  of 
a  triangle  ?  By  no  means ;  Locke  was  quite  right  in  rejecting 
the  Cartesian  claim  to  intuitions  which  were  supposed  to  yield 
up  all  knowledge  of  things  by  "  mathematical,"  i.e.  deductive, 
a  priori  reasoning.  The  scholastic  teaching  is  briefly  as 
follows : — 

First,  as  regards  our  knowledge  of  the  existence  of  substances, 
and  the  manner  in  which  we  obtain  our  concept  of  substance.  We 
get  this  concept  from  corporeal  substances,  and  afterwards  apply 
it  to  spiritual  substances ;  so  that  our  knowledge  of  the  former 
is  "immediate"  only  in  the  relative  sense  of  being  prior  to  the 
latter,  not  in  the  sense  that  it  is  a  direct  intuition  of  the  natures 
of  corporeal  substances.  We  have  no  such  direct  insight  into 
their  natures.  But  our  concept  of  them  as  actually  existing  is 
also  immediate  in  the  sense  that  at  first  we  spontaneously  conceive 
every  object  which  comes  before  our  consciousness  as  something 
existing  in  itself.  The  child  apprehends  each  separate  stimulant 
of  its  sense  perception — resistance,  colour,  sound,  etc. — as  a 
"  this  "  or  a  "  that,"  i.e.  as  a  separate  something,  existing  there 
in  itself ;  in  other  words  it  apprehends  all  realities  as  substances  : 
not,  of  course,  that  the  child  has  yet  any  reflex  knowledge  of  what 
a  substance  is,  but  unknowingly  it  applies  to  all  realities  at  first 
the  concept  which  it  undoubtedly  possesses  of  "  something  exist- 
ing in  itself".  It  likewise  apprehends  each  such  reality  as  "  one  " 
or  "  undivided  in  itself,"  and  as  "  distinct  from  other  things  ". 
Such  is  the  child's  immediate,  direct,  and  implicit  idea  of  sub- 
Since  "all  our  perceptions  are  different  from  each  other,  and  from  everything  else  in 
the  universe,  they  are  also  distinct  and  separable,  and  may  be  consider'd  as 
separately  existent,  and  may  exist  separately,  and  have  no  need  of  anything  else  to 
support  their  existence.  They  are,  therefore,  substances,  as  far  as  this  definition 
explains  a  substance." — ibid.,  §  v.  "  We  have  no  perfect  idea  of  substance,  but 
.  .  .  taking  it  for  something  that  can  exist  by  itself,  'tis  evident  every  perception  is  a 
substance,  and  every  distinct  part  of  a  perception  a  distinct  substance." — ibid. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   217 

stance.  But  if  we  are  to  believe  Hume,  what  is  true  of  the 
child  remains  true  of  the  man  :  for  the  latter,  too,  "  every  percep- 
tion is  a  substance,  and  every  distinct  part  of  a  perception  a  distinct 
substance".1  Nothing,  however,  could  be  more  manifestly  at 
variance  with  the  facts.  For  as  reason  is  developed  and  reflective 
analysis  proceeds,  the  child  most  undoubtedly  realizes  that  not 
everything  that  falls  within  its  experience  has  the  character  of 
"a  something  existing  in  itself  and  distinct  from  other  things". 
"  Walking,"  "  talking,"  and  "  actions  "  generally,  it  apprehends 
as  realities, — as  realities  which,  however,  do  not  "  exist  in  them- 
selves," but  in  other  beings,  in  the  beings  that  "walk11  and 
"  talk  "  and  "  act ".  And  these  latter  beings  it  still  apprehends 
as  "  existing  in  themselves,"  and  as  thus  differing  from  the  former, 
which  "  exist  not  in  themselves  but  in  other  things  ".  Thus  the 
child  comes  into  possession  of  the  notion  of  "  accident,"  and  of 
the  further  notion  of  "  substance  "  as  something  which  not  only 
exists  in  itself  (ovcria,  ens  in  se  subsistens\  but  which  is  also  a 
support  or  subject  of  accidents  (vTro/celjjuevov,  substans,  substare)? 
Nor,  indeed,  need  the  child's  reason  be  very  highly  developed  in 
order  to  realize  that  if  experience  furnishes  it  with  "  beings  that 
do  not  exist  in  themselves,"  there  must  also  be  beings  which  do 
exist  in  themselves  :  that  if  "  accidents  "  exist  at  all  it  would  be 
unintelligible  and  self-contradictory  to  deny  the  existence  of 
"  substances  ". 

Hence,  in  the  order  of  our  experience  the  first,  implicit  notion 
of  substance  is  that  of  "  something  existing  in  itself"  (ova-ia) ; 
the  first  explicit  notion  of  it,  however,  is  that  by  which  it  is  ap- 
prehended as  "a  subject  or  support  of  accidents"  (vTro/ceiftevov, 
sub-stare,  substantial) ;  then  by  reflection  we  go  back  to  the  ex- 
plicit notion  of  it  as  "  something  existing  in  itself".  In  the  real 
or  ontological  order  the  perfection  of  "  existing  in  itself"  is  mani- 
festly more  fundamental  than  that  of  "supporting  accidents". 
It  is  in  accordance  with  a  natural  law  of  language  that  we  name 
things  after  the  properties  whereby  they  reveal  themselves  to  us, 
rather  than  by  names  implying  what  is  more  fundamental  and 
essential  in  them.  "  To  exist  in  itself"  is  an  absolute  perfection, 
essential  to  substance ;  "  to  support  accidents  "  is  only  a  relative 
perfection ;  nor  can  we  know  a  priori  but  a  substance  might 
perhaps  exist  without  any  accidents  :  we  only  know  that  accidents 

1  Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  142  (p.  272). 

2C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  Dissert,  vi.,  ch.  Hi.,  ii,  §  592. 


2i  8  ONTOLOGY 

cannot  exist  without  some  substance,  or  subject,  or  power  which 
will  sustain  them  in  existence. 

Can  substance  be  apprehended  by  the  senses,  or  only  by 
intellect  ?  Strictly  speaking,  only  by  intellect :  it  is  neither  a 
"  proper  object "  of  any  one  sense,  such  as  taste,  or  colour,  or 
sound;  nor  a  "common  object"  of  more  than  one  sense,  as  ex- 
tension is  with  regard  to  sight  and  touch :  it  is,  in  scholastic 
language,  not  a  "  sensibile  per  se"  not  itself  an  object  of  sense 
knowledge,  but  only  "  sensibile  per  accidens"  i.e.  it  maybe  said  to 
be  "accidentally"  an  object  of  sense  because  of  its  conjunction 
with  accidents  which  are  the  proper  objects  of  sense :  so  that 
when  the  senses  perceive  accidents  what  they  are  really  perceiving 
is  the  substance  affected  by  the  accidents.  But  strictly  and  pro- 
perly it  is  by  intellect  we  consciously  grasp  that  which  in  the 
reality  is  the  substance  :  while  the  external  and  internal  sense 
faculties  make  us  aware  of  various  qualities,  activities,  or  other 
accidents  external  to  the  "self,"  or  of  various  states  and  condi- 
tions of  the  "  self,"  the  intellect — which  is  a  faculty  of  the  same 
soul  as  the  sense  faculties — makes  us  •  simultaneously  aware  of 
corporeal  substances  actually  existing  outside  us,  or  of  the  concrete 
substance  of  the  "  ego  "  or  "  self,"  existing  and  revealing  itself 
to  us  in  and  through  its  conscious  activities,  as  the  substantial, 
abiding,  and  unifying  subject  and  principle  of  these  conscious 
activities. 

Thus,  then,  do  we  attain  to  the  concept  of  substance  in 
general,  to  a  conviction  of  the  concrete  actual  existence  of  that 
mode  of  being  the  essential  characteristic  of  which  is  "  to  exist  in 
itself". 

In  the  next  place,  how  do  we  reach  a  knowledge  of  the  specific 
natures  of  substances?1  What  is  the  character,  and  what  are  the 
limitations,  of  such  knowledge?  Here,  especially,  the  very 
cautious  and  moderate  doctrine  of  scholasticism  has  been  largely 
misconceived  and  misrepresented  by  phenomenists  and  others. 
About  the  specific  nature  of  substances  we  know  just  precisely 
what  their  accidents  reveal  to  us — that  and  no  more.  We  have 
no  intuitive  insight  into  their  natures ;  all  our  knowledge  here  is 
abstractive  and  discursive.  As  are  their  properties — their  activities, 
energies,  qualities,  and  all  their  accidents — so  is  their  nature. 

1  Assuming  for  the  moment  that  we  can  know  substance  to  be  not  one  but 
manifold  :  that  experience  reveals  to  us  a  plurality  of  numerically  or  really,  and  even 
specifically  and  generically,  distinct  substances.  Cf.  infra,  p.  221, 


CA  TEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   219 

We  know  of  the  latter  just  what  we  can  infer  from  the  former. 
Operari  sequitur  esse  ;  we  have  no  other  key  than  this  to  know- 
ledge of  their  specific  natures.  We  have  experience  of  them  only 
through  their  properties,  their  behaviour,  their  activities  ;  analysis 
of  this  experience,  a  posteriori  reasoning  from  it,  inductive 
generalization  based  upon  it :  such  are  the  only  channels  we 
possess,  the  only  means  at  our  disposal,  for  reaching  a  knowledge 
of  their  natures. 

63.  PHENOMENIST  DIFFICULTIES  AGAINST  THIS  VIEW.  ITS 
VINDICATION. — Now  the  phenomenist  will  really  grant  all  this. 
His  only  objection  will  be  that  such  knowledge  of  substance  is 
really  no  knowledge  at  all ;  or  that,  such  as  it  is,  it  is  useless.  But 
surely  the  knowledge  that  this  mode  of  being  really  exists •,  that 
there  is  a  mode  of  being  which  "  exists  in  itself,"  is  already  some 
knowledge,  and  genuine  knowledge,  of  substance?  No  doubt, 
the  information  contained  in  this  very  indeterminate  and  generic 
concept  is  imperfect ;  but  then  it  is  only  a  starting  point,  an 
all-important  starting  point,  however  ;  for  not  only  is  it  perfectible 
but  every  item  of  knowledge  we  gather  from  experience  perfects 
it,  whereas  without  it  the  intellect  is  paralysed  in  its  attempt  to 
interpret  experience  :  indeed  so  indispensable  is  this  concept  of 
substance  to  the  human  mind  that,  as  we  have  seen,  no  phil- 
osopher has  ever  been  really  able  to  dispense  with  it.  When 
phenomenists  say  that  what  we  call  mind  is  only  a  bundle  of 
perceptions  and  ideas ;  when  they  speak  of  the  flow  of  events, 
which  is  ourselves,  of  which  we  are  conscious,1  the  very  language 
they  themselves  make  use  of  cries  out  against  their  professed 
phenomenism.  For  why  speak  of  "we,"  "ourselves,"  etc.,  if 
there  be  no  "we"  or  " ourselves"  other  than  the  perceptions, 
ideas,  events,  etc.,  referred  to? 

Of  course  the  explanation  of  this  strange  attitude  on  the  part 
of  these  philosophers  is  simple  enough ;  they  have  a  wrong  con- 
ception of  substance  and  of  the  relation  of  accidents  thereto  ;  they 
appear  to  imagine  that  according  to  the  traditional  teaching 
nothing  of  all  we  can  discover  about  accidents — or,  as  they  prefer 
to  term  them,  "  phenomena" — can  possibly  throw  any  light  upon 
the  nature  of  substance :  as  if  the  r61e  of  phenomena  were  to 
cover  up  and  conceal  from  us  some  sort  of  inner  core  (which  they 
call  substance),  and  not  rather  to  reveal  to  us  the  nature  of  that 

1C/.  HUXLEY,  Hume,  bk.  ii.,  ch.  ii.  TAINE,  De  L' Intelligence,  t.  i.,  Preface, 
and  passim, 


220  ONTOLOGY 

"being,  existing  in  itself,"  of  which  these  phenomena  are  the 
properties  and  manifestations. 

The  denial  of  substance  leads  inevitably  to  the  substantializing 
of  accidents.  It  is  possible  that  the  manner  in  which  some 
scholastics  have  spoken  of  accidents  has  facilitated  this  error.1 
Anyhow  the  error  is  one  that  leads  inevitably  to  contradictions  in 
thought  itself.  Mill,  for  instance,  following  out  the  arbitrary 
postulates  of  subjectivism  and  phenomenism,  finally  analysed  all 
reality  into  present  sensations  of  the  individual  consciousness, 
plus  permanent  possibilities  of  sensations.  Now,  consistently 
with  the  idealistic  postulate,  these  "  permanent  possibilities " 
should  be  nothing  more  than  a  certain  tone,  colouring,  quality  of 
the  "  present"  sensation,  due  to  the  fact  that  this  has  in  it,  as  part 
and  parcel  of  itself,  feelings  of  memory  and  expectation ;  in  which 
case  the  "  present  sensation,"  taken  in  its  concrete  fulness,  would 
be  the  sole  reality,  and  would  exist  in  itself.  This  "  solipsism  "  is 
the  ultimate  logical  issue  of  subjective  idealism,  and  it  is  a  suffi- 
cient reductio  ad  absurdum  of  the  whole  system.  Or  else,  to  evade 
this  issue,  the  "permanent  possibilities"  are  supposed  to  be 
something  really  other  than  the  "  present  sensations  ".  In  which 
case  we  must  ask  what  Mill  can  mean  by  a  "  permanent  possi- 
bility". Whether  it  be  subjective  or  objective  possibility,  it  is 
presumably,  according  to  Mill's  thought,  some  property  or  ap- 
purtenance of  the  individual  consciousness,  i.e.  a  quality  proper 
to  a  subject  or  substance.2  But  to  deny  that  the  conscious  sub- 
ject is  a  substance,  and  at  the  same  time  to  contend  that  it  is  a 
V  permanent  possibility  of  sensation,"  i.e.  that  it  has  properties 
which  can  appertain  only  to  a  substance,  is  simply  to  hold  what 
is  self-contradictory. 

After  these  explanations  it  will  be  sufficient  merely  to  state 
formally  the  proof  that  substances  really  exist.  It  is  exceedingly 
simple,  and  its  force  will  be  appreciated  from  all  that  has  been 
said  so  far:  Whatever  we  become  aware  of  as  existing  at  all 

1  £/.  §  65,  infra. 

2  Such  terms  as  "  corruptible,"  "  destructible,"  etc.,  imply  certain  attributes  of  a 
thing  which  can  be  corrupted,  destroyed.     Conceiving  this  attribute  in  the  abstract 
we  form  the  terms  "  corruptibility,"  "  destructibility,"  etc.     So,  too,  the  term  "  pos- 
sibility "  formed  from  the  adjective  "  possible,"  simply  implies  in  the  abstract  what 
the  latter  implies  in  the  concrete — an  active  or  passive  power  of  a  thing  to  cause  or 
to  become  something ;  or  else  the  mind's  conception  of  the  non-repugnance  of  this 
something.     To  substantialize  a  possibility,  therefore,  is  sufficiently  absurd;  but  to 
speak  of  a  possibility  as  real  and  at  the  same  time  to  deny  the  reality  of  any  subject 
in  which  it  would  have  its  reality,  is  no  less  so. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT  221 

must  exist  either  in  itself,  or  by  being  sustained,  supported  in 
existence,  in  something  else  in  which  it  inheres.  If  it  exists  in 
itself  it  is  a  substance ;  if  not  it  is  an  accident,  and  then  the 
"  something  else  "  which  supports  it,  must  in  turn  either  exist  in 
itself  or  in  something  else.  But  since  an  infinite  regress  in  things 
existing  not  in  themselves  but  in  other  things  is  impossible,  we 
are  forced  to  admit  the  reality  of  a  mode  of  being  which  exists 
in  itself — viz.  substance. 

Or,  again,  we  are  forced  to  admit  the  real  existence  of  acci- 
dents— or,  if  you  will,  " phenomena"  or  ' ' appearances " — i.e. 
of  realities  or  modes  of  being  whose  nature  is  manifestly  to 
modify  or  qualify  in  some  way  or  other  some  subject  in  which 
they  inhere.  Can  we  conceive  a  state  which  is  not  a  state  of 
something  ?  a  phenomenon  or  appearance  which  is  not  an  appear- 
ance of  something?  a  vital  act  which  is  not  an  act  of  a  living 
thing?  a  sensation,  thought,  desire,  emotion,  unless  of  some 
conscious  being  that  feels,  thinks,  desires,  experiences  the 
emotion?  No;  and  therefore  since  such  accidental  modes  of 
being  really  exist,  there  exists  also  the  substantial  mode  of  being 
in  which  they  inhere. 

And  the  experienced  realities  which  verify  this  notion  of 
"substance"  as  the  "mode  of  being  which  exists  in  itself,"  are 
manifestly  not  one  but  manifold.  Individual  " persons"  and 
"  things  " — men,  animals,  plants — are  all  so  many  really  and 
numerically  distinct  substances  (38).  So,  too,  are  the  ultimate 
individual  elements  in  the  inorganic  universe,  whatever  these 
may  be  (31).  Nor  does  the  universal  interaction  of  these  in- 
dividuals on  one  another,  or  their  manifold  forms  of  interdepend- 
ence on  one  another  throughout  the  course  of  their  ever-changing 
existence  and  activities,  interfere  in  any  way  with  the  substan- 
tiality of  the  mode  of  being  of  each.  These  mutual  relations  of 
all  sorts,  very  real  and  actual  as  they  undoubtedly  are,  only  con- 
stitute the  universe  a  cosmos,  thus  endowing  it  with  unity  of  order, 
but  not  with  unity  of  substance  (27). 

Let  us  now  meet  the  objection  of  Hume :  that  there  is  no 
substantial  soul  distinct  from  its  acts,  that  it  is  only  the  sum- 
total  of  the  acts,  each  of  these  being  a  substance.  The  objection 
has  been  repeated  in  the  metaphorical  language  in  which  Huxley 
and  Taine  speak  of  the  soul,  the  living  soul,  as  nothing  more 
than  a  republic  of  conscious  states,  or  the  movement  of  a  luminous 
sheaf,  etc.  And  Locke  and  Berkeley  had  already  contended 


222  ONTOLOGY 

that  an  apple  or  an  orange  is  nothing  more  than  a  collection  or 
sum-total  of  sensible  qualities,  so  that  if  we  conceive  these  re- 
moved there  is  nothing  left,  for  beyond  these  there  was  nothing 
there. 

Now  we  admit  that  the  substance  of  the  soul  is  not  adequately 
distinct  from  its  acts,  or  the  substance  of  the  apple  or  orange 
from  its  qualities.  As  a  matter  of  fact  we  never  experience  sub- 
stance apart  from  accidents  or  accidents  apart  from  substance ; * 
we  do  not  know  whether  there  exists,  or  even  whether  there  can 
exist,  a  created  substance  devoid  of  all  accidents ;  nor  can  we 
know,  from  the  light  of  reason  alone,  whether  any  accidents 
could  exist  apart  from  substance.2  We  have,  therefore,  no  ground 
in  natural  experience  for  demonstrating  such  an  adequate  real 
distinction  (38)  between  substance  and  accidents  as  would  in- 
volve the  separability  of  the  latter  from  the  former.  But  that 
the  acts  of  the  soul  are  so  many  really  distinct  entities,  each  "  ex- 
isting in  itself,"  each  therefore  a  substance,  so  that  the  term 
"  soul  "  is  merely  a  title  we  give  to  their  sum-total ;  and  similarly 
the  terms  "  apple  "  and  "  orange  "  merely  titles  of  collections  of 
qualities  each  of  which  would  be  an  entity  existing  in  itself  and 
really  distinct  from  the  others,  each  in  other  words  a  substance, 
— this  we  entirely  deny.  We  regard  it  as  utterly  unreasonable 
of  phenomenists  thus  to  multiply  substances.  Our  contention  is 
that  the  individual  soul  or  mind  is  one  substance,  and  that  it  is 
partially  and  really,  though  not  adequately,  distinct  from  the  vari- 
ous conscious  acts,  states,  processes,  functions,  which  are  certainly 
themselves  real  entities, — entities,  however,  the  reality  of  which 
is  dependent  on  that  of  the  soul,  entities  which  this  dependent 
or  "  inhering  "  mode  of  being  marks  off  as  distinct  in  their  nature, 
and  incapable  of  total  identification  with  that  other  non-inhering 
or  subsisting  mode  of  being  which  characterizes  the  substance  of 
the  soul. 

We  cannot   help  thinking  that   this  phenomenist  denial  of 

1  except  in  the  Blessed  Eucharist :  here  we  know  from  Divine  Revelation  that 
the  accidents  of  bread  and  wine  exist  apart  from  their  connatural  substance.  We 
cannot,  by  the  light  of  reason,  prove  positively  the  possibility  of  such  separate  ex- 
istence of  accidents  ;  at  the  most,  men  of  the  supreme  genius  of  an  Aristotle  may 
have  strongly  suspected  such  possibility,  and  may  have  convinced  themselves  of  the 
futility  of  all  attempts  to  prove  in  any  way  the  impossibility  of  such  a  condition  of 
things.  Nor  can  we,  even  with  the  light  of  Revelation,  do  any  more  than  show  the 
futility  of  such  attempts,  thus  negatively  defending  the  possibility  of  what  we  know 
from  Revelation  to  be  a  fact. 

*C/.  n.  i. 


CA  TEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   223 

substance,  with  its  consequent  inevitable  substantialization  of 
accidents,  is  largely  due  to  a  mistaken  manner  of  regarding  the 
concrete  existing  object  as  a  mere  mechanical  bundle  of  distinct 
and  independent  abstractions.  Every  aspect  of  it  is  mentally 
isolated  from  the  others  and  held  apart  as  an  "  impression,"  an 
"  idea,"  etc.  Then  the  object  is  supposed  to  be  constituted  by, 
and  to  consist  of,  a  sum-total  of  these  separate  "  elements," 
integrated  together  by  some  sort  of  mental  chemistry.  The 
attempt  is  next  made  to  account  for  our  total  conscious  ex- 
perience of  reality  by  a  number  of  principles  or  laws  of  what  is 
known  as  "  association  of  ideas  ".  And  phenomenists  discourse 
learnedly  about  these  laws  in  apparent  oblivion  of  the  fact  that 
by  denying  the  reality  of  any  substantial,  abiding,  self-identical 
soul,  distinct  from  the  transient  conscious  states  of  the  passing 
moment,  they  have  left  out  of  account  the  only  reality  capable 
of  "  associating "  any  mental  states,  or  making  mental  life  at 
all  intelligible.  Once  the  soul  is  regarded  merely  as  "  a  series 
of  conscious  states,"  or  a  "stream  of  consciousness,"  or  a  suc- 
cession of  "pulses  of  cognitive  consciousness,"  such  elementary 
facts  as  memory,  unity  of  consciousness,  the  feeling  of  personal 
identity  and  personal  responsibility,  become  absolutely  inexplic- 
able.1 

Experience,  therefore,  does  reveal  to  us  the  real  existence 
of  substances,  of  "  things  that  exist  in  themselves,"  and  likewise 
the  reality  of  other  modes  of  being  which  have  their  actuality 
only  by  inhering  in  the  substances  which  they  affect.  "  A  sub- 
stance," says  St.  Thomas,  "  is  a  thing  whose  nature  it  is  to  exist 
not  in  another,  whereas  an  accident  is  a  thing  whose  nature  it  is 
to  exist  in  another."5  Every  concrete  being  that  falls  within 
our  experience — a  man,  an  oak,  an  apple — furnishes  us  with 
the  data  of  these  two  concepts :  the  being  existing  in  itself,  the 
substance;  and  secondly,  its  accidents.  The  former  concept 
comprises  only  constitutive  principles  which  we  see  to  be  essential 
to  that  sort  of  being :  the  material,  the  vegetative,  the  sentient, 
the  rational  principle,  in  a  man,  or  his  soul  and  his  body ;  the 
material  principle  and  the  formal  or  vital  principle  in  an  apple. 
The  latter  concept,  that  »of  accidents,  comprises  only  those 

1  Cf.  MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  xxii.,  for  a  full  analysis  and  refutation  of  pheno- 
menist  theories  that  would  deny  the  substantiality  of  the  human  person. 

2 "  Substantia  est  res,  cujus  naturae  debetur  esse  non  in  alio ;  accidens  vero  est 
res,  cujus  naturae  debetur  esse  in  alio."— Quodlib.,  ix.,  a.  5,  ad.  2. 


224  ONTOLOGY 

characteristics  of  the  thing  which  are  no  doubt  real,  but  which 
do  not  constitute  the  essence  of  the  being,  which  can  change  or 
be  absent  without  involving  the  destruction  of  that  essence. 
An  intellectual  analysis  of  our  experience  enables  us — and,  as 
we  have  remarked  above,  it  alone  enables  us — to  distinguish 
between  these  two  classes  of  objective  concepts,  the  concept  of 
the  principles  that  are  essential  to  the  substance  or  being  that 
exists  in  itself,  and  the  concept  of  the  attributes  that  are 
accidental  to  this  being ;  and  experience  alone  enables  us,  by 
studying  the  latter  group,  the  accidents  of  the  being,  whether 
naturally  separable  or  naturally  inseparable  from  the  latter, 
to  infer  from  those  accidents  whatever  we  can  know  about  the 
former  group,  about  the  principles  that  constitute  the  specific 
nature  of  the  particular  kind  of  substance  that  may  be  under 
investigation. 

It  may,  perhaps,  be  urged  against  all  this,  that  experience 
does  not  warrant  our  placing  a  real  distinction  between  the 
entities  we  describe  as  "  accidents  "  and  those  which  we  claim  to 
be  constitutive  of  the  "  substance,"  or  "  thing  which  exists  in 
itself" ;  that  all  the  entities  without  exception,  which  we 
apprehend  by  distinct  concepts  in  any  concrete  existing  being 
such  as  a  man,  an  oak,  or  an  apple,  are  only  one  and  the  same 
individual  reality  looked  at  under  different  aspects;  that  the 
distinction  between  them  is  only  a  logical  or  mental  distinction ; 
that  we  separate  in  thought  what  is  one  in  reality  because  we 
regard  each  aspect  in  the  abstract  and  apart  from  the^others ; 
that  to  suppose  in  any  such  concrete  being  the  existence  of  two 
distinct  modes  of  reality — viz.  a  reality  that  exists  in  itself,  and 
other  realities  inhering  in  this  Jatter — is  simply  to  make  the 
mistake  of  transferring  to  the  real  order  of  concrete  things  what 
we  find  in  the  logical  order  of  conceptual  abstractions. 

This  objection,  which  calls  for  serious  consideration,  leads  to  a 
different  conclusion  from  the  previous  objection.  It  suggests  the 
conclusion,  not  that  substances  are  unreal,  but  that  accidents  are 
unreal.  Even  if  it  were  valid  it  would  leave  untouched  the 
existence  of  substances.  We  hope  to  meet  it  satisfactorily  by 
establishing  presently  the  existence  of  accidents  really  distinct 
from  the  substances  in  which  they  inhere.  While  the  objection 
draws  attention  to  the  important  truth  that  distinctions  recognized 
in  the  conceptual  order  are  not  always  real,  it  certainly  does  not 
prove  that  all  accidents  are  only  mentally  distinct  aspects  of  sub- 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   225 

stance.  For  surely  a  man's  thoughts,  volitions,  feelings,  emotions, 
his  conscious  states  generally,  changing  as  they  do  from  moment 
to  moment,  are  not  really  identical  with  the  man  himself  who 
continues  to  exist  throughout  this  incessant  change;  yet  they 
are  realities,  appearing  and  disappearing  and  having  all  their 
actuality  in  him,  while  he  persists  as  an  actual  being  "existing 
in  himself". 

64.  ERRONEOUS  VIEWS  ON  THE  NATURE  OF  SUBSTANCE. — 
If  we  fail  to  remember  that  the  notion  of  substance,  as  "  a  being 
existing  in  itself  and  supporting  the  accidents  which  affect  it," 
is  a  most  abstract  and  generic  notion ;  if  we  transfer  it  in  this 
abstract  condition  to  the  real  order ;  if  we  imagine  that  the 
concrete  individual  substances  which  actually  exist  in  the  real 
order  merely  verify  this  widest  notion  and  are  devoid  of  all 
further  content ;  that  they  possess  in  themselves  no  further  rich- 
ness of  reality;  if  we  forget  that  actual  substances,  in  all  the 
variety  of  their  natures,  as  material,  or  living,  or  sentient,  or 
rational  and  spiritual,  are  indeed  full,  vibrant,  palpitating  with 
manifold  and  diversified  reality  ;  if  we  rob  them  of  all  this  per- 
fection or  locate  it  in  their  accidents  as  considered  apart  from 
themselves, — we  are  likely  to  form  very  erroneous  notions  both 
of  substances  and  of  accidents,  and  of  their  real  relations  to  one 
another.  It  will  help  us  to  form  accurate  concepts  of  them, 
concepts  really  warranted  by  experience,  if  we  examine  briefly 
some  of  the  more  remarkable  misconceptions  of  substance  that 
have  at  one  time  or  other  gained  currency. 

(a)  Substance  is  not  a  concrete  core  on  which  concrete 
accidents  are  superimposed,  or  a  sort  of  kernel  of  which  they 
form  the  rind.  Such  a  way  of  conceiving  them  is  as  misleading 
as  it  is  crude  and  material.  No  doubt  the  language  which,  for 
want  of  better,  we  have  to  employ  in  regard  to  substance  and 
accidents,  suggests  fancies  of  that  kind :  we  speak  of  substance 
"  supporting,"  "  sustaining  "  accidents,  and  of  these  as  "  supported 
by,"  and  "  inhering  in"  the  former.  But  this  does  not  really 
signify  any  juxtaposition  or  superposition  of  concrete  entities. 
The  substance  is  a  subject  determinable  by  its  various  accidents ; 
these  are  actualizations  of  its  potentiality  ;  its  relation  to  them  is 
the  relation  of  the  potential  to  the  actual,  of  a  "  material"  or 
"determinable"  subject  to  "formal"  or  "determining"  prin- 
ciples. But  the  appearance  or  disappearance  of  accidents  never 
takes  place  in  the  same  concrete  subject :  by  their  variation?  the 

15 


226  ONTOLOGY 

concrete  subject  is  changed  :  at  any  instant  the  substance  affected 
by  its  accidents  is  one  individual  concrete  being  (27),  and  the 
inevitable  result  of  any  modification  in  them  is  that  this  individual, 
concrete  being  is  changed,  is  no  longer  the  same.  No  doubt,  it 
preserves  its  substantial  identity  throughout  accidental  change,  but 
not  its  concrete  identity, — that  is  to  say,  not  wholly.  This  is  the 
characteristic  of  every  finite  being,  subject  to  change  and  existing 
in  time :  it  has  the  actuality  of  its  being,  not  tota  simul,  but  only 
gradually,  successively  (10).  From  this,  too,  we  see  that  although 
substance  is  a  more  perfect  mode  of  being  than  accident — because 
the  former  exists  in  itself  while  the  latter  has  its  actuality  only 
in  something  else, — nevertheless,  created,  finite  substance  is  a 
mode  of  being  which  is  itself  imperfect,  and  perfectible  by 
accidents :  another  illustration  of  the  truth  that  all  created 
perfection  is  only  relative,  not  absolute.  To  the  notion  of  "  in- 
herence" we  shall  return  in  connexion  with  our  treatment  of 
accidents  (65). 

(b)  Again,  substance  is  wrongly  conceived  as  an  inert  sub- 
stratum underlying  accidents.  This  false  notion  appears  to 
have  originated  with  Descartes  :  he  conceived  the  two  great 
classes  of  created  substances,  matter  and  spirit,  as  essentially 
inert.  For  him,  matter  is  simply  a  res  extensa ;  extension  in 
three  dimensions  constitutes  its  essence,  and  extension  is  of 
course  inert :  all  motion  is  given  to  matter  and  conserved  in  it 
by  God.  Spirit  or  soul  is  simply  a  res  cogitans^  a  being  whose 
essence  is  thought ;  but  in  thinking  spirit  too  is  passive,  for  it 
simply  receives  ideas  as  wax  does  the  impress  of  a  seal.  Nay, 
even  when  soul  or  spirit  wills  it  is  really  inert  or  passive,  for 
God  puts  all  its  volitions  into  it.1  From  these  erroneous  con- 
ceptions the  earlier  disciples  of  Descartes  took  the  obvious  step, 
forward  into  Occasionalism  ;  and  to  them  likewise  may  be  traced 
the  conviction  of  many  contemporary  philosophers  that  the 
human  soul — a  being  that  is  so  eminently  vital  and  active — 
cannot  possibly  be  a  substance :  neither  indeed  could  it  be,  if 
substance  were  anything  like  what  Descartes  conceived  it  to  be. 
The  German  philosophers,  Wundt  and  Paulsen,  for  example, 
argue  that  the  soul  cannot  be  a  substance.  But  when  we  inquire 
what  they  mean  by  substance,  what  do  we  find  ?  That  with 
them  the  concept  of  substance  applies  only  to  the  corporeal 

1  Cf.  DESCARTES,  Oeuvres,  edit.   Cousin,  tome  ix.,  p.    i66—apud  MERCIER, 
Ontologie,  p.  280, 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   227 

universe,  where  it  properly  signifies  the  atoms  which  are  "the 
absolutely  permanent  substratum,  qualitatively  and  quantitatively 
unchangeable,  of  all  corporeal  reality  ".l  No  wonder  they  would 
argue  that  the  soul  is  not  a  substance ! 

No  actually  existing  substance  is  inert.  What  is  true,  how- 
ever, is  this,  that  when  we  conceive  a  being  as  a  substance,  when 
we  think  of  it  under  the  abstract  concept  of  substance,  we  of 
course  abstract  from  its  concrete  existence  as  an  active  agent ; 
in  other  words  we  consider  it  not  from  the  dynamic,  but  from 
the  static  aspect,  not  as  it  is  in  the  concrete,  but  as  constituting 
an  object  of  abstract  thought :  and  so  the  error  of  Descartes 
seems  to  have  been  that  already  referred  to, — the  mistake  of 
transferring  to  the  real  order  conditions  that  obtain  only  in  the 
logical  order. 

(c)  To  the  Cartesian  conception  of  substances  as  inert  entities 
endowed  only  with  motions  communicated  to  them  ab  extra,  the 
mechanical  or  atomist  conception  of  reality,  as  it  is  called,  Leibniz 
opposed  the  other  extreme  conception  of  substances  as  essentially 
active  entities.  For  him  substance  is  an  ens  prceditum  vi  agendi : 
activity  is  the  fundamental  note  in  the  concept  of  substance. 
These  essentially  active  entities  he  conceived  as  being  all  simple 
and  unattended,  the  corporeal  no  less  than  the  spiritual  ones. 
And  he  gave  them  the  title  of  monads.  It  is  unnecessary  for 
our  present  purpose  to  go  into  any  details  of  his  ingenious 
dynamic  theory  of  the  universe  as  a  vast  system  of  these  monads. 
We  need  only  remark  that  while  combating  the  theory  of  inert 
substances  he  himself  erred  in  the  opposite  extreme.  He  conceived 
every  monad  as  endowed  essentially  with  active  tendency  or  effort 
which  is  never  without  its  effect, — an  exclusively  immanent  effect, 
however,  which  is  the  constant  result  of  constant  immanent 
action  :  for  he  denied  the  possibility  of  transitive  activity,  actio 
transiens  ;  and  he  conceived  the  immanent  activity  of  the  monad 
as  being  in  its  nature  perceptive?  that  is  to  say,  cognitive  or  repre- 
sentative, in  the  sense  that  each  monad,  though  "wrapt  up  in 
itself,  doorless  and  windowless,"  if  we  may  so  describe  it,  never- 

1  PAULSEN,  Einleitung  in  die  Philosophic,  Berlin,  1896,  S.  135 — apud  MERCIER, 
loc,  cit. 

2  and  also  appetitive ;' as  in  mental  life  appetition  is  a  natural  consequent  of 
perception.     It  is  in  accordance  with  this  latter  idea  that  Wundt  conceives  all 
reality  as  being  in  its  ultimate  nature  appetitive  activity  :  the  Ego  is  a  "volitional 
unit  "  and  the  universe  a  "  collection  of  volitional  units  ". — Cf.  WUNDT,  System  der 
Philosophic,  Leipzig,  1889,  S.  415-421. 

is* 


228  ONTOLOGY 

theless  mirrors  more  or  less  inchoatively,  vaguely,  or  clearly,  all 
other  monads,  and  is  thus  itself  a  miniature  of  the  whole  uni- 
verse, a  microcosm  of  the  macrocosm.  Apart  from  the  fanciful- 
ness  of  his  whole  system,  a  fancifulness  which  is,  however,  perhaps 
more  apparent  than  real,  his  conception  of  substance  is  much 
less  objectionable  than  that  of  Descartes.  For  as  a  matter  of 
fact  every  individual,  actually  existing  substance  is  endowed  with 
an  internal  directive  tendency  towards  some  term  to  be  realized 
or  attained  by  its  activities.  Every  substance  has  a  transcend- 
ental relation  to  the  operations  which  are  natural  to  it,  and 
whereby  it  tends  to  realize  the  purpose  of  its  being.  But  never- 
theless substance  should  not  be  defined  by  action,  for  all  action 
of  created  substances  is  an  accident,  not  a  substance  ;  nor  even  by 
its  transcendental  relation  to  action,  for  when  we  conceive  it 
under  this  aspect  we  conceive  it  as  an  agent  or  cause,  not  as  a 
substance  simply.  The  latter  concept  abstracts  from  action  and 
reveals  its  object  simply  as  "  a  reality  existing  in  itself".  When 
we  think  of  a  substance  as  a  principle  of  action  we  describe  it 
by  the  term  nature. 

(d)  A  very  widespread  notion  of  substance  is  the  conception  of 
it  as  a  '  'permanent"  "stable"  "persisting"  subject  of  "transient," 
"ephemeral"  realities  called  accidents  or  phenomena.  This  view 
of  substance  is  mainly  due  to  the  influence  of  Kant's  philosophy. 
According  to  his  teaching  we  can  think  the  succession  of 
phenomena  which  appear  to  our  sense  consciousness  only  by  the 
aid  of  a  pure  intuition  in  which  our  sensibility  apprehends  them, 
viz.  time.  Now  the  application  of  the  category  of  substance  to 
this  pure  intuition  of  our  sensibility  engenders  a  schema  of  the 
imagination,  viz.  the  persistence  of  the  object  in  time.  Persist- 
ance,  therefore,  is  for  him  the  essential  note  of  substance. 

Herbert  Spencer,  too,  has  given  apt  expression  to  this  widely 
prevalent  notion  :  "  Existence  means  nothing  more  than  persist- 
ence ;  and  hence  in  Mind  that  which  persists  in  spite  of  all 
changes,  and  maintains  the  unity  of  the  aggregate  in  defiance  of 
all  attempts  to  divide  it,  is  that  of  which  existence  in  the  full 
sense  of  the  word  must  be  predicated — that  which  we  must 
postulate  as  the  substance  of  Mind  in  contradistinction  to  the 
varying  forms  it  assumes.  But  if  so,  the  impossibility  of  know- 
ing the  substance  of  Mind  is  manifest." * 

Thus,  substance  is  conceived  as  the  unique  but  hidden  and 

1  Principles  of  Psychology,  Pt.  ii.,  ch.  i.,  §  59. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   229 

unknowable  basis  of  all  the  phenomena  which  constitute  the 
totality  of  human  experience. 

What  is  to  be  said  of  such  a  conception  ?  There  is  just  this 
much  truth  in  it :  that  substance  is  relatively  stable  or  perma- 
nent, i.e.  in  comparison  with  accidents  ;  the  latter  cannot  survive 
the  destruction  or  disappearance  of  the  substance  in  which  they 
inhere,  while  a  substance  can  persist  through  incessant  change  of 
its  accidents.  But  accidents  are  riot  absolutely  ephemeral,  nor  is 
substance  absolutely  permanent :  were  an  accident  to  exist  for 
ever  it  would  not  cease  to  be  an  accident,  nor  would  a  substance 
be  any  less  a  substance  were  it  created  and  then  instantaneously 
annihilated.  But  in  the  latter  case  the  human  mind  could  not 
apprehend  the  substance ;  for  since  all  human  cognitive  experi- 
ence takes  place  in  time,  which  involves  duration,  the  mind  can 
apprehend  a  substance  only  on  condition  that  the  latter  has 
some  permanence,  some  appreciable  duration  in  existence.  This 
fact,  too,  explains  in  some  measure  the  error  of  conceiving  per- 
manence as  essential  to  a  substance.  But  the  error  has  another 
source  also :  Under  the  influence  of  subjective  idealism  philo- 
sophers have  come  to  regard  the  individual's  consciousness  of  his 
own  self,  the  consciousness  of  the  Ego,  as  the  sole  and  unique 
source  of  our  concept  of  substance.  The  passage  we  have  just 
quoted  from  Spencer  is  an  illustration.  And  since  the  spiritual 
principle  of  our  conscious  acts  is  a  permanent  principle  which 
abides  throughout  all  of  them,  thus  explaining  the  unity  of  the 
individual  human  consciousness,  those  who  conceive  substance 
in  general  after  the  model  of  the  Ego,  naturally  conceive  it  as  an 
essentially  stable  subject  of  incessant  and  evanescent  processes. 

But  it  is  quite  arbitrary  thus  to  conceive  the  Ego  as  the  sole 
type  of  substance.  Bodies  are  substances  as  well  as  spirits, 
matter  as  well  as  mind.  And  the  permanence  of  corporeal  sub- 
stances is  merely  relative.  Nevertheless  they  are  really  sub- 
stances. The  relative  stability  of  spirit  which  is  immortal,  and 
the  relative  instability  of  matter  which  is  corruptible,  have 
nothing  to  do  with  the  substantiality  of  either.  Both  alike  are 
substances,  for  both  alike  have  that  mode  of  being  which  consists 
in  their  existing  in  themselves,  and  not  by  inhering  in  other 
things  as  accidents  do. 

(e)  Spencer's  conception  of  substance  as  the  permanent,  un- 
knowable ground  of  phenomena,  implies  that  substance  is  one, 
not  manifold,  and  thus  suggests  the  view  of  reality  known  as 


230  ONTOLOGY 

Monism.  There  is  yet  another  mistaken  notion  of  substance, 
the  notion  in  which  the  well  known  pantheistic  philosophy  of 
Spinoza  has  had  its  origin.  Spinoza  appears  to  have  given  the 
ambiguous  definition  of  Descartes — "  Substania  est  res  quae  ita 
existit,  ut  nulla  alia  re  indigeat  ad  existendum  " — an  interpreta- 
tion which  narrowed  its  application  down  to  the  Necessary 
Being ;  for  he  defined  substance  in  the  following  terms  :  "  Per 
substantiam  intelligo  id  quod  est  in  se  etper  se  concipitur :  hoc  est,  id 
cujus  conceptus  non  indiget  conceptu  alterius  rei  a  quo  formari 
debeat ".  By  the  ambiguous  phrase,  that  substance  "  requires  no 
other  thing  for  existing,"  Descartes  certainly  meant  to  convey 
what  has  always  been  understood  by  the  scholastic  expression 
that  substance  "  exists  in  itself".  He  certainly  did  not  mean 
that  substance  is  a  reality  which  "  exists  0/ itself,"  i.e.  that  it  is 
what  scholastics  mean  by  Ens  a  se,  the  Being  that  has  its 
actuality  from  its  own  essence,  by  virtue  of  its  very  nature,  and 
in  absolute  independence  of  all  other  being  ;  for  such  Being  is 
One  alone,  the  Necessary  Being,  God  Himself,  whereas  Descartes 
clearly  held  and  taught  the  real  existence  of  finite,  created  sub- 
stances.1 Yet  Spinoza's  definition  of  substance  is  applicable 
only  to  such  a  being  that  our  concept  of  this  being  shows  forth 
the  actual  existence  of  the  latter  as  absolutely  explained  and 
.  accounted  for  by  reference  to  the  essence  of  this  being  itself,  and 
independently  of  any  reference  to  other  being.  In  other  words, 
it  applies  only  to  the  Necessary  Being.  This  conception  of  sub- 
stance is  the  starting-point  of  Spinoza's  pantheistic  philosophy. 
Now,  the  scholastic  definition  of  substance  and  Spinoza's 
definition  embody  two  entirely  distinct  notions.  Spinoza's 
definition  conveys  what  scholastics  mean  by  the  Self-Existent 

1  But  from  Descartes'  doctrine  of  two  passive  substances  so  antithetically  op- 
posed to  each  other  the  transition  to  Spinozism  was  easy  and  obvious.  If  mind  and 
matter  are  so  absolutely  opposed  as  thought  and  extension,  how  can  they  unite  to 
form  one  human  individual  in  man  ?  If  both  are  purely  passive,  and  if  God  alone 
puts  into  them  their  conscious  states  and  their  mechanical  movements  respectively, 
what  remains  proper  to  each  but  a  pure  passivity  that  would  really  be  common  to 
both  ?  Would  it  not  be  more  consistent  then  to  refer  this  thought-essence  or  re- 
ceptivity of  conscious  activities,  and  this  extension-essence  or  receptivity  of 
mechanical  movements,  to  God  as  their  proper  source,  to  regard  them  as  two  attri- 
butes of  His  unique  and  self-existent  substance,  and  thus  to  regard  God  as  sub- 
stantially immanent  in  all  phenomena,  and  these  as  only  different  expressions  of  His 
all-pervading  essence  ?  This  is  what  Spinoza  did  ;  and  his  monism  in  one  form  or 
other  is  the  last  word  of  many  contemporary  philosophers  on  the  nature  of  the 
universe  which  constitutes  the  totality  of  human  experience. — C/.  HOFFDING,  Out- 
lines of  Psychology ,  ch.  ii.,  and  criticism  of  same  apud  MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  xxiii. 


CA  TEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT    231 

Being,  Ens  a  se  ;  and  this  the  scholastics  distinguish  from  caused 
or  created  being,  ens  ab  alto.  Both  phrases  refer  formally  and 
primarily,  not  to  the  mode  of  a  being's  existence  when  it  does 
exist,  but  to  the  origin  of  this  existence  in  relation  to  the  being's 
essence ;  and  specifically,  it  marks  the  distinction  between  the 
Essence  that  is  self-explaining,  self-existent,  essentially  actual 
("a  se"),  the  Necessary  Being,  and  essences  that  do  not  them- 
selves explain  or  account  for  their  own  actual  existence,  essences 
that  have  not  their  actual  existence  from  themselves  or  of 
themselves,  essences  that  are  in  regard  to  their  actual  existence 
contingent  or  dependent,  essences  which,  therefore,  if  they  actu- 
ally exist,  can  do  so  only  dependently  on  some  other  being 
whence  they  have  derived  this  existence  ("  ab  alio  ")  and  on 
which  they  essentially  depend  for  its  continuance. 

Not  the  least  evil  of  Spinoza's  definition  is  the  confusion  caused 
by  gratuitously  wresting  an  important  philosophical  term  like 
substance  from  its  traditional  sense  and  using  it  with  quite  a  differ- 
ent meaning ;  and  the  same  is  true  in  its  measure  of  the  other 
mistaken  notions  of  substance  which  we  have  been  examining. 
By  defining  substance  as  an  ens  in  se,  or  per  se  stans^  scholastic 
philosophers  mean  simply  that  substance  does  not  depend  intrin- 
sically on  any  subjective  or  material  cause  in  which  its  actuality 
would  be  supported  ;  they  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  it  does  not 
depend  extrinsically  on  an  efficient  cause  from  which  it  has  its 
actuality  and  by  which  it  is  conserved  in  being.  They  assert 
that  all  created  substances,  no  less  than  all  accidents,  have  their 
being  " ab  alio"  from  God;  that  they  exist  only  by  the  Divine 
creation  and  conservation,  and  act  only  by  the  Divine  concursus 
or  concurrence  ;  but  while  substances  and  accidents  are  both  alike 
dependent  on  this  extrinsic  conserving  and  concurring  influence 
of  a  Divine,  Transcendent  Being,  substances  are  exempt  from  this 
other  and  distinct  mode  of  dependence  which  characterizes  acci- 
dents :  intrinsic  dependence  on  a  subject  in  which  they  have  their 
actuality.1 

When  we  say  that: substance  exists  "  in  itself,"  obviously  we  do  not  attach 
to  the  preposition  "  in  "  any  local  signification,  as  a  part  existing  "  in  "  the 
whole.  Nor  do  we  mean  that  they  exist  "  in  "  themselves  in  the  same  sense 
as  they  have  their  being  "  in  "  God.  In  a  certain  true  sense  all  creatures 
exist  "  in  "  God :  In  ipso  enim  vivimus,  et  movemur,  et  sumus  (Acts  xxii., 

1  "  Esse  substantiae  non  dependet  ab  esse  alterius  sicut  ei  inhaerens,  licet  omnia 
dependeant  a  Deo  sicut  a  causa  prima." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Causa  Matericz,  cap.  viii. 


232  ONTOLOGY 

28),  in  the  sense  that  they  are  kept  in  being  by  His  omnipresent  conserving 
power.  But  He  does  not  sustain  them  as  a  subject  in  which  they  inhere,  as 
substance  sustains  the  accidents  which  determine  it,  thereby  giving  expres- 
sion to  its  concrete  actuality.1  By  saying  that  substance  exists  "  in  itself"  we 
mean  to  exclude  the  notion  of  its  existing  "  in  another  "  thing,  as  an  accident 
does.  And  this  we  shall  understand  better  by  examining  a  little  more  closely 
this  peculiar  mode  of  being  which  characterizes  accidents. 

65.  THE  NATURE  OF  ACCIDENT.  ITS  RELATION  TO  SUB- 
STANCE. ITS  CAUSES.— From  all  that  has  preceded  we  will  have 
gathered  the  general  notion  of  accident  as  that  mode  of  real  being 
which  is  found  to  have  its  reality,  not  by  existing  in  itself,  but 
by  affecting,  determining,  some  sjubstance  in  which  it  inheres  as 
in  a  subject.  What  do  we  mean  by  saying  that  accidents  inhere 
in  substances  as  their  subjects  ?  Here  we  must  at  once  lay  aside 
as  erroneous  the  crude  conception  of  something  as  located  spati- 
ally within  something  else,  as  contained  in  container,  as  e.g. 
water  in  a  vessel ;  and  the  equally  crude  conception  of  something 
being  in  something  else  as  a  part  is  in  the  whole,  as  e.g.  an  arm 
is  in  the  body.  Such  imaginations  are  wholly  misleading. 

The  actually  existing  substance  has  its  being  or  reality  ;  it  is 
an  actual  essence.  Each  real  accident  of  it  is  likewise  a  reality, 
and  has  an  essence,  distinct  from  that  of  the  substance,  yet  not 
wholly  independent  of  the  latter :  it  is  a  determination  of  the 
determinable  being  of  the  substance,  affecting  or  modifying  the 
latter  in  some  way  or  other,  and  having  no  other  raison  d'etre 
than  this  role  of  actualizing  in  some  specific  way  some  receptive 
potentiality  of  the  concrete  substance.  And  since  its  reality  is 
thus  dependent  on  that  of  the  substance  which  it  affects,  we  can- 
not ascribe  to  it  actual  essence  or  being  in  the  same  sense  as  we 
ascribe  this  to  substance,  but  only  analogically2  (2).  Hence 
scholastics  commonly  teach  that  we  ought  to  conceive  an  accident 
rather  as  an  "entity  of  an  entity"  "ens  entis"  than  as  an  entity 
simply  ;  rather  as  inhering,  indwelling,  affecting  (zVz-esse)  some 
subject,  than  simply  as  existing  itself  (esse} ;  as  something  whose 
essence  is  rather  the  determination,  affection,  modification  of  an 
essence  than  itself  an  essence  proper,  the  term  "  essence  "  desig- 
nating properly  only  a  substance  :  accidentis  esse  est  inesse. 3  This 

1  C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.  §  594. 

2  Ibid.,  §§597-6oo. 

3  "  Illud  proprie  dicitur  esse,  quod  ipsum  habet  esse,  quasi  in  suo  esse  subsistens. 
Unde  solae  substantiae  proprie  et  vere  dicuntur  entia ;  accidens  vero  non  habet  esse, 
sed  eo  aliquid  est,  et  hac  ratione  ens  dicitur  :  sicut  albedo  dicitur  ens  quia  ea  aliquid 
est  album.    Et  propter  hoc  dicitur  in  Metaph.,  1.  7  [al.  6],  c.  i.  [Arist.],  quod  accidens 


CA  TEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   233 

conception  might,  no  doubt,  if  pressed  too  far,  be  inapplicable  to 
absolute  accidents,  like  quantity,  which  are  something  more  than 
mere  modifications  of  substance ;  but  it  rightly  emphasizes  the 
dependence  of  the  reality  of  accident  on  that  of  substance,  the 
non-substantial  and  "  diminished  "  character  of  the  "  accident  "- 
mode  of  being ;  it  also  helps  to  show  that  the  "  inherence  "  of 
accident  in  substance  is  a  relation — of  determining  to  determin- 
able  being — which  is  sui  generis  ;  and  finally  it  puts  us  on  our 
guard  against  the  errors  that  may  be,  and  have  been,  committed 
by  conceiving  accidents  in  the  abstract  and  reasoning  about  them 
apart  from  their  substances,  as  if  they  themselves  were  substances. 
This  "inherence"  of  accident  in  substance,  this  mode  of 
being  whereby  it  affects,  determines  or  modifies  the  substance, 
differs  from  accident  to  accident ;  these,  in  fact,  are  classified 
into  suprema  genera  by  reason  of  their  different  ways  of  affecting 
substance  (60).  To  this  we  shall  return  later.  Here  we  may 
inquire,  about  this  general  relation  of  accident  to  substance, 
whether  it  is  essential  to  an  accident  actually  to  inhere  in  a  sub- 
stance, if  not  immediately,  then  at  least  through  the  medium  of 
some  other  accident.  We  suggest  this  latter  alternative  because 
as  we  shall  see  presently  there  are  some  accidents,  such  as  colour, 
taste,  shape,  which  immediately  affect  the  extension  of  a  body, 
and  only  through  this  the  substance  of  the  body  itself.  Now  the 
ordinary  course  of  nature  never  presents  us  with  accidents 
except  as  inhering,  mediately  or  immediately,  in  a  substance. 
Nor  is  it  probable  that  the  natural  light  of  our  reason  would  ever 
suggest  to  us  the  possibility  of  an  exception  to  this  general  law. 
But  the  Christian  philosopher  knows,  from  Divine  Revelation, 
that  in  the  Blessed  Eucharist  the  quantity  or  extension  of  bread 
and  wine,  together  with  the  taste,  colour,  form,  etc.,  which  affect 
this  extension,  remain  in  existence  after  their  connatural  substance 
of  bread  and  wine  has  disappeared  by  transubstantiation.  In  the 

dicitur  magis  entis  quam  ens." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.  q.  90,  art.  2. 
"  Illud  cui  advenit  accidens,  est  ens  in  se  completum  consistens  in  suo  esse,  quod 
quidem  esse  naturaliter  praecedit  accidens,  quod  supervenit :  et  ideo  accidens  super- 
veniens,  ex  conjunctione  sui  cum  eo,  cui  supervenit,  non  causat  illud  esse  in  quo  res 
subsistit  per  quod  res  est  ens  per  se :  sed  causat  quoddam  esse  secundum,  sine  quo  res 
subsistens  intelligi  potest  esse,  sicut  primum  potest  intelligi  sine  secundo,  vel  praedi- 
catum  sine  subjecto.  Unde  ex  accidente  et  subjecto  non  fit  unum  per  se,  sed  unum 
per  accidens,  et  ideo  ex  eorum  conjunctione  non  resultat  essentia  quaedam,  sicut  ex 
conjunctione  formae  cum  materia  :  propter  quod  accidens  neque  rationem  completae 
essentiae  habet,  neque  pars  completae  essentiae  est,  sed  sicut  est  ens  secundum  quid, 
ita  et  essentiam  secundum  quid  habet." — De  Ente  et  Essentia,  ch.  vii. 


234  ONTOLOGY 

supernatural  order  of  His  providence  God  preserves  these  acci- 
dents in  existence  without  a  subject ;  but  in  this  state,  though 
they  do  not  actually  inhere  in  any  substance,  they  retain  their 
natural  aptitude  and  exigence  for  such  inherence.  The  Christian 
philosopher,  therefore,  will  not  define  accident  as  "  the  mode  of 
being  which  inheres  in  a  subject,"  but  as  "  the  mode  of  being 
which  in  the  ordinary  course  of  nature  inheres  in  a  subject,"  or  as 
"  the  mode  of  being  which  has  a  natural  exigence  to  inhere  in  a 
subject ".  It  is  not  actual  inherence,  but  the  natural  exigence  to 
inhere,  that  is  essential  to  an  accident  as  such.1 

Furthermore,  an  accident  needs  a  substance  not  formally  qua 
substance,  or  as  a  mode  of  being  naturally  existing  in  itself;  it 
needs  a  substance  as  a  subject  in  which  to  inhere,  which  it  will  in 
some  way  affect,  determine,  qualify  ;  but  the  subject  in  which  it 
immediately  inheres  need  not  always  be  a  substance  :  it  may  be 
some  other  accident,  in  which  case  both  of  course  will  naturally 
require  some  substance  as  their  ultimate  basis. 

Comparing  now  the  concept  of  accident  with  that  of  substance, 
we  find  that  the  latter  is  presupposed  by  the  former  ;  that  the 
latter  is  prior  in  thought  to  the  former  ;  that  we  conceive  accident 
as  something  over  and  above,  something  superadded  to  substance 
as  subject.  For  instance,  we  can  define  matter  and  form  without 
the  prior  concept  of  body,  or  animality  and  rationality  without 
the  prior  concept  of  man ;  but  we  cannot  define  colour  with- 
out the  prior  concept  of  body,  or  the  faculty  of  speech  without 
the  prior  concept  of  man.2 

Substance,  therefore,  is  prior  in  thought  to  accident ;  but  is 
the  substance  itself  also  prior  temporally  (prior  tempore]  to  its 
accidents  ?  It  is  prior  in  time  to  some  of  them,  no  doubt ;  the 
individual  human  being  is  thus  prior,  for  instance,  to  the  know- 
ledge he  may  acquire  during  life.  But  there  is  no  reason  for 
saying  that  a  substance  must  be  prior  in  time  to  all  its  acci- 
dents ; 3  so  far  as  we  can  discover,  no  created  substance  comes  into 
existence  devoid  of  all  accidents  :  corporeal  substance  devoid  of 
internal  quantity,  or  spiritual  substance  devoid  of  intellect  and 
will. 

1 "  Non  est  deftnitio  substantiae,  ens  per  se  sine  subjecto,  nee  definitio  accidentis, 
ens  in  subjecto  ;  sed  quidditati  seu  essentiae  substantiae  competit  habere  esse  non  in 
subjecto ;  quidditati  autem  sive  essentiae  accidentis  competit  habere  esse  in  subjecto." 
— ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Tkeol.,  Hi.,  q.  77,  art.  i,  ad.  2. 

2C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.t  §§  595-596. 

3  ibid.,  §  619. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   235 

If  prior  in  thought,  though  not  necessarily  in  time,  to  its 
accidents,  is  a  substance  prior  to  its  accidents  really,  onto- 
logically  (prior  natura)  ?  Yes  ;  it  is  the  real  or  ontological 
principle  of  its  accidents ;  it  sustains  them,  and  they  depend 
on  it.  It  is  a  passive  or  material  cause  (using  the  term  "  mate- 
rial "  in  the  wide  sense,  as  applicable  even  to  spiritual  sub- 
stances), or  a  receptive  subject,  determined  in  some  way  by 
them  as  formal  principles.  It  is  at  the  same  time  an  efficient  and 
passive  cause  of  -some  of  its  own  accidents  :  the  soul  is  an 
efficient  cause  of  its  own  immanent  processes  of  thought  and 
volition,  and  at  the  same  time  a  passive  principle  of  them,  under- 
going real  change  by  their  occurrence.  Of  others  it  is  merely  a 
receptive,  determinable  subject,  of  those,  namely,  which  have  an 
adequate  and  necessary  foundation  in  its  own  essence,  and  which 
are  called  properties  in  the  strict  sense  :  without  these  it  cannot 
exist,  though  they  do  not  constitute  its  essence,  or  enter  into  the 
concept  of  the  latter ;  but  it  is  not  prior  to  them  in  time,  nor  is 
it  the  efficient  cause  of  them  ;  it  is,  however,  a  real  principle  of 
them,  an  essence  from  the  reality  of  which  they  necessarily 
result,  and  on  which  their  own  reality  depends.  Such,  for  in- 
stance, is  the  faculty  of  thought,  or  volition,  or  speech  in  regard 
to  man. 

The  accident-mode  of  being  is,  therefore,  a  mode  of  being 
which  determines  a  substance  in  some  real  way.  Its  formal  effect 
is  to  give  the  substance  some  real  and  definite  determination : 
not  esse  simpliciter  but  esse  tale.  With  the  substance  it  con- 
stitutes a  concrete  real  being  which  is  unum  per  accidem,  not 
unum  per  se. 

The  accident  has  no  formal  cause :  it  is  itself  a  "  form  "  and 
its  causality  is  that  of  a  formal  cause,  which  consists  in  its 
communicating  itself  to  a  subject,  and,  by  its  union  therewith, 
constituting  some  new  reality — in  this  case  a  concrete  being 
endowed  with  "  accidental  "  unity. 

Accidents  have  of  course,  a  material  cause ;  not,  however, 
in  the  sense  of  a  materia  ex  qua,  a  material  from  which  they 
are  constituted,  inasmuch  as  they  are  simple  "  forms  "  ;  but  in 
the  sense  of  a  subject  in  which  they  are  received  and  in  which 
they  inhere ;  and  this  "  material  cause "  is,  proximately  or 
remotely,  substance. 

Substance  also  is  the  final  cause,  the  raison  d'etre,  of  the 
reality  of  the  accidental  mode  of  being.  Accidents  exist  for  the 


236  ONTOLOGY 

perfecting  of  substances :  accidentia  sunt  propter  substantiam. 
As  we  have  seen  already,  and  as  will  appear  more  clearly  later 
on,  the  fundamental  reason  for  the  reality  of  an  accidental  mode 
of  being,  really  distinct  from  the  created  or  finite  substance  (for 
the  Infinite  Substance  has  no  accidents),  is  that  the  created 
substance  is  imperfect,  limited  in  its  actual  perfection,  does  not 
exist  tota  simul,  but  develops,  through  a  process  of  change  in 
time,  from  its  first  or  essential  perfection,  through  intermediate 
perfections,  till  it  reaches  the  final  perfection  (46)  of  its  being. 

Have  all  accidents  efficient  causes  ?  Those  which  are  called 
common  accidents  as  distinct  from  proper  accidents  or  properties 
(66)  have  undoubtedly  efficient  causes :  the  various  agencies 
which  produce  real  but  accidental  changes  in  the  individual 
substances  of  the  universe.  Proper  accidents,  however,  inasmuch 
as  they  of  necessity  exist  simultaneously  with  the  substances  to 
which  they  belong,  and  flow  from  these  substances  by  a  necessity 
of  the  very  essence  of  these  latter,  cannot  be  said  to  have  any 
efficient  causes  other  than  those  which  contribute  by  their  effi- 
ciency to  the  substantial  changes  by  which  these  substances  are 
brought  into  actual  existence ;  nor  can  they  be  said  to  be  caused 
efficiently  by  these  substances  themselves,  but  only  to  "  flow  "  or 
"  result "  necessarily  from  the  latter,  inasmuch  as  they  come  into 
existence  simultaneously  with,  but  dependently  on,  these  sub- 
stances. Hence,  while  substances  are  universally  regarded  as 
real  principles  of  their  properties — as,  for  instance,  the  soul  in 
regard  to  intellect  and  will,  or  corporeal  substance  in  regard  to 
quantity — they  are  not  really  efficient  causes  of  their  properties, 
i.e.  they  do  not  produce  these  properties  by  action.  For  these 
properties  are  antecedent  to  all  action  of  the  substance ;  nor  can 
a  created  substance  act  by  its  essence,  but  only  through  active 
powers,  or  faculties,  or  forces,  which  meditate  between  the  essence 
of  a  created  substance  and  its  actions,  and  which  are  the  proxi- 
mate principles  of  these  actions,  while  the  substance  or  nature  is 
their  remote  principle.  Hence  the  " properties"  which  neces- 
sarily result  from  a  substance  or  nature,  have  as  their  efficient 
causes  the  agencies  productive  of  the  substance  itself.1 

66.  MAIN  DIVISIONS  OF  ACCIDENTS.— These  considerations 
will  help  us  to  understand  the  significance  of  a  few  important 
divisions  of  accidents  :  into  proper  and  common,  inseparable  and 
separable.  We  shall  then  be  in  a  position  to  examine  the  nature 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §§  320-325. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   237 

of  the  distinction  between  accidents  and  substance,  and  to 
establish  the  existence  of  accidents  really  distinct  from  sub- 
stance. 

(a)  The  attributes  which  we  affirm  of  substance,  other  than 
the  notes  constitutive  of  its  essence,  are  divided  into  proper  acci- 
dents, or  properties  in  the  strict  sense  (VSiov,  proprium],  and 
common  accidents,  or  accidents  in  the  more  ordinary  sense 
(o-v/jifaprjKos,  ac-cidens).  A  property  is  an  accident  which  belongs 
exclusively  to  a  certain  class  or  kind  of  substance,  and  is  found 
always  in  all  members  of  that  class,  inasmuch  as  it  has  an  ade- 
quate foundation  in  the  nature  of  that  substance  and  a  necessary 
connexion  therewith.  Such,  for  instance,  are  the  faculties  of 
intellect  and  will  in  all  spiritual  beings ;  the  faculties  of  speak- 
ing, laughing,  weeping  in  man ;  the  temporal  and  spatial  mode 
of  being  which  characterizes  all  created  substances.1  When 
regarded  from  the  logical  point  of  view,  as  attributes  predicable 
of  their  substances  considered  as  logical  subjects,  they  are  dis- 
tinguished on  the  one  hand  from  what  constitutes  the  essence  of 
this  subject  (as  genus,  differentia,  species),  but  also  on  the  other 
hand  from  those  attributes  which  cannot  be  seen  to  have  any 
absolutely  necessary  connexion  with  this  subject.  The  latter 
attributes  alone  are  called  logical  accidents,  the  test  being  the 
absence  of  a  necessary  connexion  in  thought  with  the  logical 
subject.2  But  the  former  class,  which  are  distinguished  from 
"  logical  "  accidents  and  called  logical  properties  (" propria  ")  are 
none  the  less  real  accidents  when  considered  from  the  ontological 
standpoint ;  for  they  do  not  constitute  the  essence  of  the  sub- 
stance; they  are  outside  the  concept  of  the  latter,  and  super- 
added — though  necessarily — to  it.  Whether,  however,  all  or 
any  of  these  "  properties,"  which  philosophers  thus  classify  as 
real  or  ontological  accidents,  "  proper "  accidents,  of  certain 
substances,  are  really  distinct  from  the  concrete,  individual  sub- 
stances to  which  they  belong,  or  are  only  aspects  of  the  latter, 
"  substantial  modes,"  only  virtually  distinct  in  each  case  from  the 
individual  substance  itself, — is  another  and  more  difficult  question 
(69).  Such  a  property  is  certainly  not  really  separable  from 

1  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §§  618,  624. 

2  This  logical  usage  is  applied  equally  to  attributes  of  a  logical  subject  which 
is  not  itself  a  substance  but  an  accident ;  it  turns  solely  on  the  point  whether  the 
concept  of  the  logical  predicate  of  a  judgment  is  or  is  not  connected  by  an  absolute 
logical    connexion,   a  connexion  of   thought,   with    the  concept  of   the  logical 
subject, 


238  ONTOLOGY 

its  substance ;  we  cannot  conceive  either  to  exist  really  without 
the  other ;  though  we  can  by  abstraction  think,  and  reason,  and 
speak,  about  either  apart  from  the  other.1  Real  inseparability 
is,  however,  regarded  by  scholastic  philosophers  as  quite 
compatible  with  what  they  understand  by  a  real  distinction  (38). 

A  common  accident  is  one  which  has  no  such  absolutely 
necessary  connexion  with  its  substance  as  a  "  property  "  has  ;  one 
which,  therefore,  can  be  conceived  as  absent  from  the  substance 
without  thereby  entailing  the  destruction  of  the  latter's  essence, 
or  of  anything  bound  up  by  a  necessity  of  thought  with  this 
essence.  And  such  common  accidents  are  of  two  kinds. 

They  may  be  such  that  in  the  ordinary  course  of  nature,  and 
so  far  as  its  forces  and  laws  are  concerned,  they  are  never  found 
to  be  absent  from  their  connatural  substances — inseparable  acci- 
dents. Thus  the  colour  of  the  Ethiopian  is  an  inseparable 
accident  of  his  human  nature  as  an  Ethiopian  ;  he  is  naturally 
black ;  but  if  born  of  Ethiopian  parents  he  would  still  be  an 
Ethiopian  even  if  he  happened  to  grow  up  white  instead  of  black. 
We  could  not,  however,  conceive  an  Ethiopian,  or  any  other 
human  being,  existing  without  the  faculties  (not  the  use)  of 
intellect  and  will,  or  the  faculty  (hot  the  organs,  or  the  actual 
exercise  of  the  faculty)  of  human  speech. 

Or  common  accidents  may  be  such  that  they  are  sometimes 
present  in  their  substances,  and  sometimes  absent — separable  acci- 
dents. These  are  by  far  the  most  numerous  class  of  accidents  : 
thinking,  willing,  talking,  and  actions  generally  ;  health  or  ill- 
ness ;  virtues,  vices,  acquired  habits ;  rest  or  motion,  temperature, 
colour,  form,  location,  etc. 

(fj)  The  next  important  division  of  accidents  is  that  into  mere 
extrinsic  denominations  and  intrinsic  accidents ;  the  latter  being 
subdivided  into  modal  and  absolute  accidents,  respectively. 

An  absolute  accident  is  one  which  not  merely  affects  its  sub- 
stance intrinsically,  giving  the  latter  an  actual  determination  or 
mode  of  being,  of  some  sort  or  other,  but  which  has  moreover 
some  entity  or  reality  proper  to  itself  whereby  it  thus  affects  the 
substance,  an  entity  really  distinct  from  the  essence  of  the  sub- 
stance thus  determined  by  it.  Such,  for  instance,  are  all  vital 
activities  of  living  things ; 2  knowledge,  and  other  acquired 
habits ;  quantity,  the  fundamental  accident  whereby  corporeal 

1C/.  ST.  THOMAS,  Quaest.  Disp.,  De  Spir.  Great.,  art.  n,  ad.  7. 
z  Cf.,  however,  §  68,  p.  246,  n.  2,  infra. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   239 

substances  are  all  capable  of  existing  extended  in  space ;  and 
such  sensible  qualities  and  energies  of  matter  as  heat,  colour, 
mechanical  force,  electrical  energy,  etc.  Such,  too,  according  to 
many,  are  intellect,  will,  and  sense  faculties  in  man. 

There  are,  however,  other  intrinsic  determinations  of  substance, 
other  modifications  of  the  latter,  which  do  not  seem  to  involve 
any  new  or  additional  reality  in  the  substance,  over  and  above 
the  modification  itself.  Such,  for  instance,  are  motion,  rest, 
external  form  or  figure,  in  bodies.  These  are  called  modal  acci- 
dents. They  often  affect  not  the  substance  itself  immediately, 
but  some  absolute  accident  of  the  latter,  and  are  hence  called 
"accidental  modes  ".  Those  enumerated  are  obviously  modes  of 
the  quantity  of  bodies.  Now  the  appearance  or  disappearance 
of  such  an  accident  in  a  substance  undoubtedly  involves  a  real 
change  in  the  latter,  and  not  merely  in  our  thought ;  when  a 
body  moves,  or  comes  to  rest,  or  alters  its  form,  there  is  a  change 
in  the  reality  as  well  as  in  our  thought ;  and  in  this  sense 
these  accidents  are  real  and  intrinsic  to  their  substances.  Yet, 
though  we  cannot  say  that  motion,  rest,  shape,  etc.,  are  really 
identical  with  the  body  and  only  mentally  distinct  aspects  of  it, 
at  the  same  time  neither  can  we  say  that  by  their  appearance  or 
disappearance  the  body  gains  or  loses  any  reality  other  than  an 
accidental  determination  of  itself ;  whereas  it  does  gain  something 
more  than  this  when  it  is  heated,  or  electrified,  or  increased  in 
quantity;  just  as  a  man  who  acquires  knowledge,  or  virtue,  is 
not  only  really  modified,  but  is  modified  by  real  entities  which  he 
has  acquired,  not  having  actually  possessed  them  before. 

Finally,  there  are  accidents  which  do  not  affect  the  substance 
intrinsically  at  all,  which  do  not  determine  any  real  change  in  it, 
but  merely  give  it  an  extrinsic  denomination  in  relation  to 
something  outside  it  (60).  Thus,  while  the  quality  of  heat  is  an 
absolute  accident  in  a  body,  the  action  whereby  the  latter  heats 
neighbouring  bodies  is  no  new  reality  in  the  body  itself,  and  pro- 
duces no  real  change  in  the  latter,  but  only  gives  it  the  extrinsic 
denomination  of  heating  in  reference  to  these  other  bodies  in 
which  the  effect  really  takes  place.  Similarly  the  location  of  any 
corporeal  substance  in  space  or  in  time,  relatively  to  others  in  the 
space  or  time  series — its  external  place  (ubi)  or  time  (guandd),  as 
they  are  called — or  the  relative  position  of  its  parts  (situs)  in  the 
place  occupied  by  it :  these  do  not  intrinsically  determine  it  or 
confer  upon  it  any  intrinsic  modification  of  its  substance.  Not, 


240  ONTOLOGY 

indeed,  that  they  are  mere  entia  rationis^  mere  logical  fictions  of 
our  thought.  They  are  realities,  but  not  realities  which  affect 
the  substances  denominated  from  them ;  they  are  accidental 
modes  of  other  substances,  or  of  the  absolute  accidents  of  other 
substances.  Finally,  the  accident  which  we  call  a  "  real  relation  " 
presupposes  in  its  subject  some  absolute  accident  such  as  quantity 
or  quality,  or  some  real  and  intrinsic  change  determining  these,  or 
affecting  the  substance  itself;  but  whether  relation  is  itself  a 
reality  over  and  above  such  foundation,  is  a  disputed  question. 

From  these  classifications  of  accidents  it  will  be  at  once 
apparent  that  the  general  notion  of  accident,  as  a  dependent 
mode  of  being,  superadded  to  the  essence  of  a  substance  and  in 
some  way  determining  the  latter,  is  realized  in  widely  different 
and  merely  analogical  ways  in  the  different  ultimate  classes  of 
accidents. 

67.  REAL  EXISTENCE  OF  ACCIDENTS.  NATURE  OF  THE 
DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  ACCIDENTS  AND  SUBSTANCE.  -  It  would 
be  superfluous  to  prove  the  general  proposition  that  accidents 
really  exist.  In  establishing  the  real  existence  of  substances  we 
have  seen  that  the  real  existence  of  some  accidents  at  least  has 
never  been  seriously  denied.  These  are  often  called  nowadays 
phenomena ;  and  philosophers  who  have  denied  or  doubted  the 
real  existence  of  substances  have  been  called  "  phenomenists " 
simply  because  they  have  admitted  the  real  existence  only  of 
these  phenomena ;  though,  if  they  were  as  logical  as  Hume  they 
might  have  seen  with  him  that  such  denial,  so  far  from  abolish- 
ing substance,  could  only  lead  to  the  substantializing  of  accidents 

(63)- 

But  while  undoubtedly  there  are  realities  which  "exist  in 
themselves,"  such  as  individual  men,  animals  and  plants,  there  is 
no  reason  for  attributing  this  same  mode  of  existence  to  entities 
such  as  the  thoughts,  volitions,  emotions,  virtues  or  vices,  of  the 
individual  man ;  or  the  instinct,  hunger,  or  illness  of  the  dog ; 
or  the  colour,  perfume,  or  form  of  the  rose.  The  concrete 
individual  man,  or  dog,  or  rose,  reveals  itself  to  our  minds  as  a 
substantial  entity,  affected  with  these  various  accidental  entities 
which  are  really  distinct  from  the  substantial  entity  itself  and 
from  one  another.  Nay,  in  most  of  the  instances  just  cited,  they 
are  physically  separable  from  the  substantial  entity  in  which  they 
inhere ;  not  of  course  in  the  sense  that  they  could  actually  exist 
without  it,  but  in  the  sense  that  it  can  and  does  continue  to  exist 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   241 

actually  without  them  (38) ;  for  it  continues  to  exist  while  they 
come  and  go,  appear  and  disappear.1  Of  course  the  concrete 
individual  man,  or  dog,  or  rose,  does  not  continue  to  exist  actually 
unchanged,  and  totally  identical  with  itself  throughout  the  change 
of  accidents  (64),  for  the  accidents  are  part  of  the  concrete 
individual  reality  ;  nay,  even  the  substance  itself  of  the  concrete 
individual  does  not  remain  totally  unaffected  by  the  change  of 
the  accidents ;  because  if  they  really  affect  it,  as  they  do,  their 
change  cannot  leave  it  totally  unaffected ;  substance  is  not  at  all 
a  changeless,  concrete  core,  surrounded  by  an  ever-changing 
rind  or  vesture  of  accidents ;  or  a  dark,  hidden,  immutable  and 
inscrutable  background  of  a  panorama  of  phenomena  (64).  But 
though  it  is  beyond  all  doubt  really  affected  by  the  change  of  its 
accidents,  it  is  also  beyond  all  doubt  independent  of  them  in 
regard  to  the  essential  mode  of  its  being,  in  as  much  as  it  exists 
and  continues  to  exist  in  itself  throughout  all  fluctuation  of  its 
accidents ;  while  these  on  the  other  hand  have  only  that  essenti- 
ally dependent  mode  of  being  whereby  they  are  actual  only  by 
affecting  and  determining  some  subject  in  which  they  inhere  and 
which  supports  their  actuality. 

The  existence,  therefore,  of  some  accidents,  which  are  not 
only  really  distinct  but  even  physically  separable  from  their 
substances,  cannot  reasonably  be  called  into  question.  To  deny 
the  existence  of  such  accidents,  or,  what  comes  to  the  same  thing, 
their  real  distinction  from  substance,  is  to  take  up  some  one  of 
these  three  equally  untenable  positions :  that  all  the  changes 
which  take  place  within  and  around  us  are  substantial  changes ; 
or,  that  there  is  no  such  thing  as  real  change,  all  change  being  a 
mental  illusion ;  or,  that  contradictory  states  can  be  affirmed  of 
the  same  reality.2 

But  the  nature  of  the  real  distinction  between  accidents  and 
substance  is  not  in  all  cases  so  easy  to  determine.  Nor  can  we 
discuss  the  question  here  in  reference  to  each  summuin  genus  of 
accident  separately.  Deferring  to  the  chapter  on  Relation  the 
question  of  the  distinction  of  this  particular  accident  from  sub- 

1  St.  Thomas,  whose  language  is  usually  so  moderate,  thus  expresses  his  view 
of  the  doctrine  afterwards  propounded  by  Descartes  when  the  latter  declared  the 
essence  of  the  soul  to  be  thought :  "  Quidquid  dicatur  de  potentiis  animae,  tamen 
nullus  unquam  opinatur,  nisi  insanus,  quod  habitus  et  actus  animae  sint  ipsa  ejus 
essentia. — Quaest.  Disp.,  De  Spir.  Great.,  art.  u,   ad  i.     For  a  very  convincing 
treatment  of  this  question,  cf.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §§  625-626. 

2  DE  SAN,  Cosmologia,  §  323,  apud  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  158. 

16 


242  ONTOLOGY 

stance  and  the  other  categories,  we  may  confine  our  attention 
here  to  the  distinction  between  substance  and  the  three  classes 
of  accidents  we  have  called  extrinsic  denominations •,  modal  acci- 
dents, and  absolute  accidents  respectively.  "  There  are  accidents," 
writes  Kleutgen,1  "  which  place  nothing  and  change  nothing  in  the 
subject  itself,  but  are  ascribed  to  it  by  reason  of  some  extrinsic 
thing ;  others,  again,  produce  indeed  in  the  subject  itself  some 
new  mode  of  being,  but  without  their  existing  in  it  as  a  new 
reality,  distinct  from  its  reality ;  others,  finally,  are  themselves  a 
new  reality,  and  have  thus  a  being  which  is  proper  to  themselves, 
though  this  being  is  of  course  dependent  on  the  substance. 
These  latter  alone  can  be  really  distinct  from  the  substance,  in 
the  full  sense  in  which  a  real  distinction  is  that  between  thing 
and  thing.  Now  Cartesian  philosophers  have  denied  that  there 
are  any  such  accidents  as  those  of  the  latter  class  ;  rejecting  \  the 
division  of  accidents  into  absolute  and  modal,  they  teach  that  all 
accidents  are  mere  modifications  or  determinations  of  substance, 
that  they  consist  solely  of  various  locations  and  combinations  of 
the  ultimate  parts  of  a  substance,  or  relations  of  the  latter  to 
other  substances." 

Now  all  extrinsic  denominations  of  a  substance  do  seem  on 
analysis  ultimately  to  resolve  themselves  partly  into  relations  of 
the  latter  to  other  substances,  and  partly  into  modal  or  absolute 
accidents  of  other  substances.  Hence  we  may  confine  our 
attention  here  to  the  distinction  between  these  two  classes  of 
accident  and  their  connatural  substances. 

And,  approaching  this  question,  it  will  be  well  for  us  to  bear  two  things  in 
mind.  In  the  first  place,  our  definitions  both  of  substance  and  of  accident  are 
abstract  and  generic  or  universal.  But  the  abstract  and  universal  does  not 
exist  as  such.  The  concrete,  individual,  actually  existing  substance  is  never 
merely  "a  being  that  naturally  exists  in  itself,"  nor  is  the  accident  of  such  a 
substance  merely  a  verification  of  its  definition  as  "  a  being  that  naturally 
inheres  in  something  else  ".  In  every  case  what  really  and  actually  exists  is 
the  individual,  a  being  concreted  of  substance  and  accidents,  a  being  which 
is  ever  and  always  a  real  unity,  composite  no  doubt,  but  really  one ;  and 
this  no  matter  what  sort  of  distinction  we  hold  to  obtain  between  the  substance 
and  its  accidents.  This  is  important ;  its  significance  will  be  better  appreciated 
according  as  we  examine  the  distinctions  in  question.  Secondly,  as  scholastics 
understand  a  real  distinction,  this  can  obtain  not  merely  between  different 
"  persons  "  or  "things  "  which  are  separate  from  one  another  in  time  or  space, 
but  also  between  different  constitutive  principles  of  any  one  single  concrete, 
composite,  individual  being  (38).  We  have  seen  that  they  are  not  agreed  as 

1op.  cit.,  §  625. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT  243 

to  whether  the  essence  and  the  existence  of  any  actual  creature  are  really 
distinct  or  not  (24).  And  it  may  help  us  to  clear  up  our  notion  of  "  accident  " 
if  we  advert  here  to  their  discussion  of  the  question  whether  or  not  an 
accident  ought  to  be  regarded  as  having  an  existence  of  its  own,  an  existence 
pioper  to  itself. 

Those  who  think  that  the  distinction  between  essence  and  existence  in 
created  things  is  a  real  distinction,  hold  that  accidents  as  such  have  no  exist- 
ence of  their  own,  that  they  are  actualized  by  the  existence  of  the  substance, 
or  rather  of  the  concrete,  composite  individual ;  that  since  the  latter  is  a  real 
unity — not  a  mere  artificial  aggregation  of  entities,  but  a  being  naturally 
one — it  can  have  only  one  existence  :  Impossibile  est  quod  unius  rei  non  sit 
unum  esse ; a  that  by  this  one  existence  the  concrete,  composite  essence  of 
the  substance,  as  affected  and  determined  by  its  accidents,  is  actualized. 
They  contend  that  if  each  of  the  principles,  whether  substantial  or  accidental, 
of  a  concrete  individual  being  had  its  own  existence,  their  union,  no  matter 
how  intimate,  could  not  form  a  natural  unitary  being,  an  individual,  but  only 
an  aggregate  of  such  beings.  It  is  neither  the  matter,  nor  the  form,  nor  the 
corporeal  substance  apart  from  its  accidents,  that  exists  :  it  is  the  substance 
completely  determined  by  all  its  accidents  and  modes  that  is  the  proper  sub- 
ject of  existence.2  It  alone  is  actualized,  and  that  by  one  existence,  which  is 
the  "  ultimate  actuality  "  of  the  concrete,  composite,  individual  essence  :  esse 
est  ultimus  actus.  Hence  it  is  too,  they  urge,  that  an  accident  should  be 
conceived  not  properly  as  "  a  being,"  but  only  as  that  whereby  a  being  is 
such  or  such  :  Accidens  non  est  ens,  sed  ens  entis.  But  it  cannot  be  so  con- 
ceived if  we  attribute  to  it  an  existence  of  its  own  ;  for  then  it  would  be 
"  a  being  "  in  the  full  and  proper  sense  of  the  word. 

This  is  the  view  of  St.  Thomas,  and  of  Thomists  generally.  The  arguments 
in  support  of  it  are  serious,  but  not  convincing.  And  the  same  may  be  said 
of  the  reasons  adduced  for  the  opposite  view  :  that  existence  not  being  really 
distinct  from  essence,  accidents  in  so  far  as  they  can  be  said  to  have  an 
essence  of  their  own  have  likewise  an  existence  of  their  own. 

Supporters  of  this  view  not  only  admit  but  maintain  that  the  entity  of  a 
real,  existing  accident  is  a  "  diminished  "  entity,  inasmuch  as  it  is  dependent 
in  a  sense  in  which  a  really  existing  substance  is  not  dependent.  They  simply 
deny  the  Thomist  assertion  that  substantial  and  accidental  principles  cannot 
combine  to  form  a  real  and  natural  unit,  an  individual  being,  if  each  be 
accorded  an  existence  appropriate  and  proportionate  to  its  partial  essence  ; 
nor  indeed  can  Thomists  prove  this  assertion.  Moreover,  if  existence  be  not 
really  distinct  from  essence,  there  is  no  more  inconvenience  in  the  claim  that 

1  ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  iii.,  q.  17,  art.  2,  c. 

2  Hence  St.  Thomas  says,  in  regard  to  the  Blessed  Eucharist,  that  the  accidents 
of  bread  and  wine  had  not  an  existence  of  their  own  as  long  as  the  substance  of 
bread  and  wine  was  there ;  that  this  is  true  of  accidents  generally ;  that  it  is  not 
they  that  exist,  but  rather  their  subjects ;  that  their  function  is  to  determine  these 
subjects  to  exist  as  characterized  in  a  certain  way,  as  whiteness  gives  snow  a  white 
existence  :  "  Dicendum  quod  accidentia  panis  et  vini,  manente  substantia  panis  et 
vini  non  habebant  ipsa  esse  sicut  nee  alia  accidentia,  sed  subjecta  eorum  habebant 
hujusmodi  esse  per  ea,  sicut  nix  est  alba  per  albedinem." — Summa  Theol.,  iii.,  q.  77, 
art.  i,  ad.  4. 

16* 


244  ONTOLOGY 

partial  existences  can  combine  to  form  one  complete  existence,  unum  esse, 
than  in  the  Thomist  claim  that  partial  essences,  such  as  substantial  and 
accidental  constitutive  principles,  can  combine  to  form  one  complete  essence, 
one  individual  subject  of  existence.  Then,  furthermore,  it  is  urged  that  the 
substance  exists  prior  in  time  to  some  of  its  accidents ;  that  it  is  prior  in 
nature  to  its  properties,  which  are  understood  to  proceed  or  flow  from  it ;  and 
that  therefore  its  existence  cannot  be  theirs,  any  more  than  its  essence  can  be 
theirs.  Finally,  it  is  pointed  out  that  since  existence  is  the  actuality  of  essence, 
the  existence  which  actualizes  a  substance  cannot  be  identical  with  that  which 
actualizes  an  accident.  At  all  events,  whether  the  one  existence  of  the  con- 
crete individual  substance  as  determined  by  its  accidents  be  as  it  were  a 
simple  and  indivisible  existential  act,  which  actualizes  the  composite  individual 
subject,  as  Thomists  hold,  or  whether  it  be  a  composite  existential  act,  really 
identical  with  the  composite  individual  subject,  as  in  the  other  view,1  this 
concrete  existence  of  the  individual  is  constantly  varying  with  the  variation 
of  the  accidents  of  the  individual.  This  is  equally  true  on  either  view. 

Inquiring  into  the  distinction  between  substance  and  its  in- 
trinsic accidents,  whether  modal  or  absolute,  we  have  first  to 
remark  that  all  accidents  cannot  possibly  be  reduced  to  relations ; 
for  if  relation  itself  is  something  extrinsic  to  the  things  related,  it 
must  at  least  presuppose  a  real  and  intrinsic  foundation  or  basis 
for  itself  in  the  things  related.  Local  motion,  for  instance,  is  a 
change  in  the  spatial  relations  of  a  body  to  other  bodies.  But 
it  cannot  be  merely  this.  For  if  spatial  relations  are  not  mere 
subjective  or  mental  fabrications,  if  they  are  in  any  intelligible 
sense  real,  then  a  change  in  them  must  involve  a  change  of  some- 
thing intrinsic  to  the  bodies  concerned.  Now  Descartes,  in 
denying  the  existence  of  absolute  accidents,  in  reducing  all 
accidents  to  modes  of  substances,  understood  by  modes  not  any 
intrinsic  determinations  of  substance,  but  only  extrinsic  determina- 
tions of  the  latter.  All  accidents  of  material  substance  were  for 
him  mere  locations,  arrangements,  dispositions  of  its  extended 
parts  :  extension  being  its  essence.  Similarly,  all  accidents  of 
spiritual  substance  were  for  him  mere  modalities  and  mutual  rela- 
tions of  its  "thought  "  or  "  consciousness  "  :  this  latter  being  for 
him  the  essence  of  spirit.  We  have  here  not  only  the  error  of 
identifying  or  confounding  accidents  such  as  thought  and  exten- 
sion with  their  connatural  substances,  spirit  and  matter,  but  also 
the  error  of  supposing  that  extrinsic  relations  and  modes  of  a 

1  For  the  arguments  on  both  sides  cf.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  §  156  (pp.  308  sqq.). 
The  indirect  argument  which  the  author  derives  from  the  fact  that  the  Divine 
Concursus  is  necessary  for  the  activity  of  creatures,  while  offering  an  intelligible 
explanation  of  this  necessity  on  Thomistic  principles,  does  not  touch  the  probability 
of  other  explanations. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   245 

substance,  and  changes  in  these,  can  be  real,  without  there  being 
in  the  substances  themselves  any  intrinsic,  real,  changeable 
accidents,  which  would  account  for  the  extrinsic  relations  and 
their  changes.  If  there  are  no  intrinsic  accidents,  really  affect- 
ing and  determining  substances,  and  yet  really  distinct  from  the 
latter,  then  we  must  admit  either  that  all  change  is  an  illusion 
or  else  that  all  change  is  substantial ;  and  this  is  the  dilemma 
that  really  confronts  the  Cartesian  philosophy. 

68.  MODAL  ACCIDENTS  AND  THE  MODAL  DISTINCTION. — 
The  real  distinction  which  we  claim  to  exist  between  a  substance 
and  its  intrinsic  accidents  is  not  the  same  in  all  cases  :  in  regard  to 
some  accidents,  which  we  have  called  intrinsic  modes  of  the  sub- 
stance, it  is  a  minor  or  modal  real  distinction  ;  in  regard  to  others 
which  we  have  called  absolute  accidents,  it  is  a  major  real  dis- 
tinction (38).  Let  us  first  consider  the  former. 

The  term  mode  has  a  variety  of  meanings,  some  very  wide, 
some  restricted.  When  one  concept  determines  or  limits  another 
in  any  way  we  may  call  it  a  mode  of  the  latter.  If  there  is  no 
real  distinction  between  the  determining  and  the  determined 
thought-object,  the  mode  is  called  a  metaphysical  mode :  as 
rationality  is  of  animality  in  man.  Again,  created  things  are  all 
"  modes "  of  being ;  and  the  various  aspects  of  a  creature  may 
be  called  "  modes  "  of  the  latter  :  as  "  finiteness  "  is  a  mode  of 
every  created  being.  We  do  not  use  the  term  in  those  wide 
senses  in  the  present  context.  Here  we  understand  by  a  mode 
some  positive  reality  which  so  affects  another  and  distinct  reality 
as  to  determine  the  latter  proximately  to  some  definite  way  of 
existing  or  acting,  to  which  the  latter  is  itself  indifferent ;  without, 
however,  adding  to  the  latter  any  new  and  proper  entity  other  than 
the  said  determination.1  Such  modes  are  called  physical  modes. 
And  some  philosophers  maintain  that  there  are  not  only  accidental 
modes,  thus  really  distinct  from  the  substance,  but  that  there  are 
even  some  substantial  modes  really  distinct  from  the  essence  of 
the  substance  which  they  affect :  for  instance,  that  the  really  dis- 
tinct constitutive  principles  of  any  individual  corporeal  substance, 
matter  and  form,  are  actually  united  only  in  virtue  of  a  substan- 
tial mode  whereby  each  is  ordained  for  union  with  the  other  ;  or 
that  subsistence,  whereby  the  individual  substance  is  made  a 

1  C/.  URRABURU'S  definition  :  "  entitas  vel  realitas  a  subjecto  realiter  distincta, 
cujus  totum  esse  consistit  in  ultima  determinatione  rei  ad  aliquod  munus  obeundum, 
vel  ad  aliquam  realem  denominationem  actu  habendam,  sine  qua,  saltern  in  individuo 
sumpta,  res  eadem  potest  existere  absolute". — op.  cit.,  §  120  (p.  380), 


246  ONTOLOGY 

subsistent  and  incommunicable  "person"  or  "thing,"  is  a  sub- 
stantial mode  of  the  individual  nature.1  With  these  latter  we 
are  not  concerned  here,  but  only  with  accidental  modes,  such  as 
external  shape  or  figure,  local  motion,  position,  action,2  etc. 
Now  when  a  substance  is  affected  by  such  accidents  as  these  it 
is  impossible  on  the  one  hand  to  maintain  that  they  add  any 
new  positive  entity  of  their  own  to  it ;  they  do  not  seem  to  have 
any  reality  over  and  above  the  determination  or  modification  in 
which  their  very  presence  in  the  substance  consists.  And  on  the 
other  hand  it  cannot  be  denied  that  they  express  some  real 
predicate  which  can  be  affirmed  of  the  substance  in  virtue  of 
their  presence  in  it,  and  that  independently  of  our  thought ;  in  other 
words  it  cannot  be  maintained  that  they  are  mere  figments  or 
forms  of  thought,  mere  entia  rationis.  If  a  piece  of  wax  has  a 
certain  definite  shape,  this  shape  is  inseparable  from  the  wax : 
it  is  nothing  except  in  the  wax,  for  it  cannot  exist  apart  from 
the  wax  ;  but  in  the  wax  it  is  something  in  some  real  sense  dis- 
tinct from  the  wax,  inasmuch  as  the  wax  would  persist  even  if  it 
disappeared.  No  doubt  it  is  essential  to  the  wax,  as  extended 
in  space,  to  have  some  shape  or  other  ;  but  it  is  indifferent  to 
any  particular  shape,  and  hence  something  distinct  from  it  is  re- 
quired to  remove  this  indifference.  This  something  is  the  parti- 
cular shape  it  actually  possesses.  The  shape,  therefore,  is  an 
accidental  mode  of  the  extension  of  the  wax,  a  mode  which  is 
really  distinct,  by  a  minor  real  distinction,  from  this  extension 
which  is  its  immediate  subject.3  Hence  we  conclude  that  there 
are  accidental  modes,  or  modal  accidents,  really  distinct  from 
the  subjects  in  which  they  inhere. 

69.  DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  SUBSTANCE  AND  ITS  "PROPER" 
ACCIDENTS.  UNITY  OF  THE  CONCRETE  BEING.— Turning  next 
to  the  distinction  between  absolute  accidents  and  substance,  we 
have  seen  already  that  separable  absolute  accidents  such  as 
acquired  habits  of  mind  and  certain  sensible  qualities  and  energies 
of  bodies  are  really  distinct  from  their  subjects.  Absolute  ac- 

1  Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  291  (p.  854,  quarto,  opinio),  p.  854. 

2  Whether  immanent  vital  acts — especially  of  the  spiritual  faculties  in  man  : 
thoughts,  volitions,  etc. — are  mere  modes,  or  whether  they  are  absolute  accidents, 
having  their  own  proper  and  positive  reality  which  perfects  their  subject  by  affecting 
it,  is  a  disputed  question.     Habits,  acquired  by  repetition  of  such  acts,  e.g.  know- 
ledge and  virtue,  belonging  as  they  do  to  the  category  of  quality,  are  more  than 
mere  modalities  of  the  human  subject :   they  have  an   absolute,  positive   entity, 
whereby  they  add  to  the  total  perfection  of  the  latter. 

3  Cf.  URRABURU,  op,  cit,,  §  121  (pp.  386  sqq.). 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   247 

cidents  which  are  naturally  inseparable  from  their  subjects — such 
as  external  quantity  or  spatial  extension  or  volume  is  in  regard 
to  the  corporeal  substance — are  also  really  distinct  from  their 
subjects ;  though  we  cannot  know  by  reason  alone  whether  or 
how  far  such  accidents  are  absolutely  separable  from  these  subjects  : 
from  Christian  Revelation  we  know  that  extension  at  least  is 
separable  from  the  substance  of  a  body,  and  with  extension  all 
the  other  corporeal  accidents  which  inhere  immediately  in  ex- 
tension.1 

But  a  special  difficulty  arises  in  regard  to  the  nature  of  the 
distinction  between  a  substance  and  improper  accidents, 2z>.  those 
which  have  such  an  adaquate  and  necessary  ground  in  the  essence 
of  the  substance  that  the  latter  cannot  exist  without  them :  ac- 
cidents which  are  simultaneous  with  the  substance  and  proceed 
necessarily  from  it,  such  as  the  internal  quantity  of  a  corporeal 
substance,  or  the  intellectual  and  appetitive  powers  or  faculties 
of  a  spiritual  substance.  The  medieval  scholastic  philosophers 
were  by  no  means  unanimous  as  to  the  nature  of  this  distinction. 
Their  discussion  of  the  question  centres  mainly  around  the  dis- 
tinction between  the  spiritual  human  soul  and  its  spiritual  faculties, 
intellect  and  will,  and  between  these  faculties  themselves.  It  is 
instructive — as  throwing  additional  light  on  what  they  understood 
by  a  real  distinction — to  find  that  while  Thomists  generally 
have  held  that  the  distinction  here  in  question  is  a  real  dis- 
tinction, many  other  scholastics  have  held  that  it  is  only  a  virtual 
distinction,  while  Scotists  have  generally  taught  that  it  is  a  formal 
distinction  (35-39). 

Kleutgen 3  interprets  the  formal  distinction  advocated  by 
Scotus  in  the  present  context  as  really  equivalent  to  the  virtual 
distinction.  St.  Bonaventure,  after  referring  to  the  latter  dis- 
tinction, and  to  the  real  distinction  propounded  by  St.  Thomas, 
adopts  himself  an  intermediate  view :  that  the  faculties  of  the 

1  The  fact  that  Aristotle  [Metaph.,  lib.  vii.  (al.  vi.),  ch.  Hi.]  seems  to  have  placed  a 
real  distinction  between  extension  and  corporeal  substance,  while  he  could  not  have 
suspected  the  absolute  separability  of  the  former  from  the  latter,  would  go  to  show 
that  he  did  not  regard  separability  as  the  only  test  of  a  real  distinction.  Cf. 
KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  ibid. 

3  Obviously  we  are  not  concerned  here  with  all  the  attributes  which  by  a  necessity 
of  thought  we  ascribe  to  an  essence,  e.g.  the  corruptibility  of  a  corporeal  substance, 
or  the  immortality  of  a  spiritual  substance.  These  are  not  entities  really  distinct 
from  the  substance,  but  only  aspects  which  we  recognize  to  be  necessary  corollaries 
of  its  nature.  We  are  concerned  only  with  properties  which  are  real  powers, 
faculties,  forces,  aptitudes  of  things. — Cf.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  627. 

3  op.  cit.,  §  628. 


248  ONTOLOGY 

soul  are  indeed  really  distinct  from  one  another,  but  nevertheless 
are  not  really  distinct,  as  accidental  entities,  from  the  substance 
of  the  soul  itself.  We  see  how  this  can  be  by  considering  that 
the  material  and  formal  principles  which  constitute  a  corporeal 
substance,  though  really  distinct  from  each  other,  are  not  really 
distinct  from  the  substance  itself.  They  are  not  accidents  of 
the  latter  but  constitute  its  essence,  and  so  are  to  be  referred  re- 
ductive to  the  category  of  substance.  So,  by  analogy,  the  faculties 
of  the  soul,  though  really  distinct  from  each  other,  do  not  belong 
to  any  accidental  category  really  distinct  from  the  substance  of 
the  soul,  but  belong  reductive  to  the  latter  category,  not  indeed  as 
constituting,  but  as  flowing  immediately  and  necessarily  from,  the 
substance  of  the  soul  itself.1  And,  like  St.  Thomas,  he  finds  the 
ultimate  source  and  explanation  of  this  multiplicity  of  faculties 
and  forces  in  the  finiteness  of  the  created  substance  as  such.2 
But  St.  Thomas  went  farther  than  St.  Bonaventure,  for  he  taught 
— as  indeed  Thomists  generally  teach,  and  many  who  are  not 
Thomists — that  the  faculties  of  the  human  soul  are  really  distinct 
from  one  another,  not  merely  as  proximate  principles  of  really 
distinct  vital  acts,  but  as  accidental  entities  or  essences ;  and 
that  as  such  they  are  really  distinct  from  the  essence  or  substance 
itself  of  the  human  soul.  The  arguments  in  favour  of  this  view 

1 "  Tertii  sunt,  qui  dicunt,  quod  potentiae  animae  nee  adeo  sunt  idem  ipsi  animae, 
sicut  sunt  ejus  principia  intrinsica  et  essentialia,  nee  adeo  diversae,  ut  cedant  in 
aliud  genus,  sicut  accidentia ;  sed  in  genere  substantiae  sunt  per  reductionem  .  .  . 
et  ideo  quasi  medium  tenentes  inter  utramque  opinionem  dicunt,  quasdam  animae 
potentias  sic  differre  ad  invicem,  ut  nullo  modo  dici  possint  una  potentia :  non  tamen 
concedunt,  eas  simpliciter  diversificari  secundum  essentiam,  ita  ut  dicantur  diversae 
essentiae,  sed  differre  essentialiter  in  genere  potentiae,  ita  ut  dicantur  diversa  instru- 
menta  ejusdem  substantiae." — In  lib.  ii.,  dist.  xxiv.,  p.  i,  art.  2,  q.  i. 

In  the  same  context  he  explains  what  we  are  to  understand  by  referring  any- 
thing to  a  certain  category  per  reductionem  :  "  Sunt  enim  quaedam,  quae  sunt  in 
genere  per  \se,  aliqua  per  reductionem  ad  idem  genus.  Ilia  per  se  sunt  in  genere, 
quae  participant  essentiam  completam  generis,  ut  species  et  individua ;  ilia  vero  per 
reductionem,  quae  non  dicunt  completam  essentiam.  .  .  .  Quaedam  reducuntur 
sicut  principia  .  .  .  aut  essentialia,  sicut  sunt  materia  et  forma  in  genere  sub- 
stantiae ;  aut  integrantia,  sicut  partes  substantiae.  .  .  .  Quaedam  reducuntur  sicut 
viae  ...  aut  sicut  viae  ad  res,  et  sic  motus  et  mutationes,  ut  generatio,  reducuntur 
ad  substantiam ;  aut  sicut  viae  a  rebus,  et  sic  habent  reduci  potentiae  ad  genus 
substantiae.  Prima  enim  agendi  potentia,  quae  egressum  dicitur  habere  ab  ipsa 
substantia,  ad  idem  genus  reducitur,  quae  non  adeo  elongatur  ab  ipsa  substantia, 
ut  dicat  aliam  essentiam  completam." — ibid.,  ad.  8. 

2  "  Quoniam  potentia  creaturae  arctata  est,  non  potuit  creatura  habere  posse 
perfectum,  nisi  esset  in  ea  potentiarum  multitudo,  ex  quarum  collectione  sive 
adunatione,  una  supplente  defectum  alterius,  resultaret  unum  posse  completum,  sicut 
manifeste  animadvert}  potest  in  organis  humani  corporis,  quorum  unumquodque 
indiget  a  virtute  alterius  adjuvari." — In  lib.  ii.,  dist.  xxiv.,  p.  i,  art.  2,  q.  8. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   249 

will  be  given  in  their  proper  place  in  connexion  with  the  category 
of  Quality.  If  they  are  not  demonstrative  in  their  force,  they  are 
certainly  such  that  the  view  for  which  they  make  is  very  highly 
probable ;  but  we  are  concerned  here  to  show,  in  this  concluding 
section,  that  the  recognition  of  a  real  distinction  in  general  be- 
tween substance  and  its  accidents  does  not  in  any  way  compro- 
mise the  real  unity  of  the  concrete  individual  being.  It  has  been 
widely  accused  of  doing  so  by  philosophers  who  try  to  discredit 
this  view  without  fully  understanding  it.  This  characteristically 
modern  attitude  is  illustrated  by  the  persistent  attempts  that 
have  been  made  in  recent  times  to  throw  ridicule  on  what  they 
describe  as  the  "faculty  psychology".1 

The  source  of  this  groundless  charge  lies  partly  in  the  mis- 
taken conception  of  accident  and  substance  as  concrete  entities 
superadded  the  one  to  the  other ;  partly  in  the  mistaken  notion 
that  the  union  of  substance  and  accidents  cannot  result  in  a  real 
unity,  that  there  cannot  be  more  or  less  perfect  grades  of  real 
unity  (27) ;  and  partly  in  the  false  assumption  that  real  distinc- 
tion always  implies  mutual  separability  of  concrete  entities.  Of 
these  errors  we  need  only  refer  to  that  concerning  unity. 

Modern  philosophers  not  uncommonly  conceive  the  union  of 
substance  and  accidents  as  being  necessarily  a  mere  mechanical 
union  or  aggregation,  and  oppose  it  to  "  organic  "  unity  which 
they  regard  as  a  real  unity  involving  the  richness  of  an  energetic, 
"  living  "  multiplicity.  This  involves  a  misrepresentation  of  the 
traditional  scholastic  view.  The  union  of  substance  and  accident 
is  not  a  mechanical  union.  Nothing  could  be  farther  from  the 
minds  of  the  scholastic  interpreters  of  Aristotle  than  the  con- 
ception of  the  ultimate  principles  of  the  universe  of  our  experience 
as  inert  entities  moved  according  to  purely  mechanical  laws ;  or 
of  the  individual  concrete  being  as  a  mere  machine,  or  a  mere 
aggregate  of  mechanical  elements.  They  recognized  even  in  the 
individual  inorganic  substance  an  internal,  unifying,  active  and 
directive  principle  of  all  the  energies  and  activities  of  the  thing 
— its  substantial  form.  And  if  this  is  all  those  philosophers 
mean  by  the  metaphorical  transference  of  the  terms  "  organic 
unity,"  "  internal  living  principle  of  development,"  etc.,  to  the 
mineral  world,  they  are  so  far  in  accord  with  the  traditional 

1  The  student  will  find  in  MAKER'S  Psychology  (ch.  iii.)  a  clear  and  well-reasoned 
exposition  of  the  inconsistency  and  groundlessness  of  such  attacks  on  the  doctrine 
of  faculties. 


250  ONTOLOGY 

scholastic  philosophy ; l  while  if  they  mean  that  all  substances 
are  principles  of  "  vital "  energy,  or  that  all  reality  is  one  organic 
unity,  in  the  literal  sense  of  these  terms,  they  are  committing 
themselves  either  to  the  palpably  false  theory  of  pan-psychism, 
or  to  the  gratuitous  reassertion  of  a  very  old  and  very  crude 
form  of  monism. 

By  "  organic "  unity  we  understand  the  unity  of  any  living 
organism,  a  unity  which  is  much  more  perfect  than  that  of  the 
parts  of  a  machine,  or  than  any  natural  juxtaposition  of  material 
parts  in  an  inorganic  whole ;  for  the  organs,  though  distinct  in 
number  and  in  nature  from  one  another,  are  united  by  an  internal 
principle  to  form  one  living  individual,  so  that  if  any  organ  were 
separated  from  the  living  organism  it  would  cease  to  be  an  organ.2 
But  organic  unity  is  not  by  any  means  the  most  perfect  kind  of 
unity  conceivable.3  The  living  organism  exists  and  develops 
and  attains  to  the  perfection  of  its  being  only  through  a 
multiplicity  of  integral  parts  extended  in  space.  The  spiritual 
substance  is  subject  to  no  such  dispersion  of  its  being.  From  its 
union  with  the  faculties  whereby  it  attains  to  its  natural  develop- 
ment, there  results  a  real  unity  of  a  higher  order  than  that  of  any 
organism. 

And  nevertheless,  even  though  the  unity  of  the  concrete 
spiritual  substance  and  its  faculties  be  so  far  higher  than  a 
mechanical  or  even  an  organic  unity,  it  is  not  perfect.  Even 
though  the  faculties  of  the  soul  be  determinations  of  its  sub- 
stance, even  though  they  flow  from  it  as  actualities  demanded 
by  its  essence  for  the  normal  and  natural  development  of  its 

1  Cf.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  636-637. 

2 "Cum  corpus  hominis  aut  cujuslibet  alterius  animalis  sit  quoddam  totum 
naturale,  dicit  unum  ex  eo  quod  unam  formam  habeat  qua  perficitur  non  solum 
secundum  aggregationem  aut  compositionem,  ut  accidit  in  domo  et  in  aliis  hujus- 
modi.  Unde  opportet  quod  quaelibet  pars  hominis  et  animalis  recipiat  esse 
[i.e.  sibi  proprium]  et  speciem  ab  anima  sicut  a  propria  forma.  Unde  Philosophus 
dicit  (1.  ii.  de  anima,  text.  9),  quod  recedente  anima  neque  oculus  neque  caro  neque 
aliqua  pars  manet  nisi  aequivoce." — ST.  THOMAS,  Quaest.  Disp.  de  anima,  art.  10 
— apud  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  632. 

3  The  most  perfect  real  unity  is  of  course  that  which  includes  all  perfection  in 
the  simplicity  of  its  actual  essence,  without  any  dispersion  or  plurality  of  its  being, 
without  any  admixture  of  accident  or  potentiality.  Such  is  the  unity  of  the  Infinite 
Being  alone.  No  finite  being  possesses  its  actuality  tota  simul.  And  the  creature 
falls  short  of  perfect  unity  in  proportion  as  it  attains  to  this  actuality  only  by  a 
multiplicity  of  real  changes,  by  a  variety  of  really  distinct  principles  and  powers, 
essential  and  accidental,  in  its  concrete  mode  of  being.  In  proportion  as  created 
things  are  higher  or  lower  in  the  scale  of  being  (47),  they  realize  a  higher  or  a  lower 
grade  of  unity  in  their  mode  of  individual  existence. 


CATEGORIES  OF  BEING.     SUBSTANCE  AND  ACCIDENT   251 

being,  still  it  is  a  complete  subsisting  essence  of  its  kind  with- 
out them ;  it  possesses  its  essential  perfection  without  them, 
so  that  however  intimate  be  their  union  with  it  they  can  never 
form  one  essence  with  it ;  it  needs  them  only  for  the  fuller 
development  of  its  being  by  acquiring  further  intermediate  pre- 
fections  and  thus  attaining  to  its  final  perfection  (46). 

And  here  we  touch  on  the  most  fundamental  ground  of  the 
distinction,  in  all  created  things,  between  their  substance  and 
their  accidental  perfections.  Unlike  the  Necessary,  Absolute 
Being,  whose  infinite  perfection  is  the  eternal  actuality  of  His 
essence,  no  creature  possesses  the  actuality  of  its  being  tota  simul, 
but  only  by  a  progressive  development  whereby  it  gradually 
acquires  really  new  intermediate  and  final  perfections,  really 
distinct  from,  though  naturally  due  to,  its  essence.  Hence,  even 
though  some  of  its  accidents — properties  such  as  the  powers  and 
faculties  we  have  been  discussing — be  not  really  distinct  from 
the  essence  wherewith  they  are  necessarily  connected,  this  is  not 
true  of  its  acquired  habits  and  dispositions,  or  of  the  activities 
which  proceed  from  these  latter  as  their  proximate  principles. 
At  the  same  time  the  concrete  being  is,  at  every  moment  of  its 
existence  and  development,  a  real  unity,  but  a  unity  which,  in- 
volving in  itself  as  it  does  a  real  multiplicity  of  distinct  principles, 
must  ever  fall  infinitely  short  of  the  perfect  type  of  real  unity — 
that  realized  only  in  the  Self-Existent,  Necessary  Being. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

I 

NATURE  AND  PERSON. 

70.  SOME  DIVISIONS  OF  SUBSTANCES.— In  the  preceding 
chapter  we  discussed  the  nature  of  substance  and  accident  in 
general,  and  the  relation  between  a  substance  and  its  accidents. 
We  must  next  examine  the  category  of  substance  more  in  detail, 
terminating  as  it  does  in  the  important  concept  of  personality  or 
person.  This  latter  conception  is  one  which  must  have  its  origin 
for  all  philosophers  in  the  study  of  the  human  individual,  but  which, 
for  scholastic  philosophers,  is  completed  and  perfected  by  the  light 
of  Christian  Revelation,  We  shall  endeavour  to  show  in  the  first 
place  what  can  be  gathered  from  the  light  of  reason  about  the 
constitution  of  personality,  and  also  briefly  to  note  how  Christian 
Revelation  has  increased  our  insight  into  the  perfections  involved 
in  it.  As  leading  up  to  the  concept  of  person,  we  must  set  forth 
certain  divisions  or  classifications  of  substance :  into  -first  and 
second  substances,  and  into  complete  and  incomplete  substances.1 

(a)  The  specific  and  generic  natures  of  substantial  entities  do 
not  inhere,  like  accidents,  in  individual  substances  ;  they  consti- 
tute the  essence  of  the  latter,  and  hence  these  universals  are  called 
substances.  But  the  universal  as  such  does  not  really  exist ; 
it  is  realized  only  in  individuals ;  in  the  logical  order  it  pre-sup- 
poses  the  individual  as  a  logical  subject  of  which  it  is  affirmed, 
a  subjectum  attributionis  seu  praedicationis.  Hence  it  is  called  a 
second  substance,  while  the  individual  substance  is  called  a  first 
substance.  Of  course  we  can  predicate  attributes  of  universal 
substances,  and  use  these  as  logical  subjects,  as  when  we  say 
11  Man  is  mortal ".  But  such  propositions  have  no  real  meaning, 
and  give  us  no  information  about  reality,  except  in  so  far  as  we 
can  refer  their  predicates  (" mortal"),  through  the  medium  of 
their  universal  subjects  ("  man  "),  back  ultimately  to  the  individual 

1  We  are  concerned  here  only  with  finite,  created  substances,  as  distinct  from 
the  Divine  Uncreated  Substance  on  whom  these  depend  (64). 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  253 

substances  (John,  James,  etc.)  which  alone  are  real,  and  in  which 
alone  the  universal  ("man")  has  its  reality.  Hence  the  indi- 
vidual is,  in  the  logical  order,  the  ultimate  and  fundamental  sub- 
ject of  all  our  predications.  And  furthermore,  the  individual 
substance  cannot  be  used  as  a  logical  predicate  of  anything  un- 
derlying itself,  while  the  universal  substance  can  be  so  used  in 
relation  to  the  individual. 

In  the  ontological  order,  of  course,  the  universal  substance  is 
individualized,  and,  as  individual,  it  is  the  subject  in  which  all 
accidents  inhere,  their  subfectum  inhaesionis :  the  only  subject  of 
many  of  them,  and  the  remote  or  ultimate  subject  of  those  of 
them  which  inhere  immediately  in  other  accidents. 

Thus  while  in  the  ontological  order  all  substances,  whether 
we  think  of  them  as  universal  or  as  individual,  are  the  ultimate 
subjects  of  inhesion  for  all  real  accidents,  in  the  logical  order  it 
is  only  the  individual  substance  that  is  the  ultimate  subject  of 
attribution  for  all  logical  predicates.  Hence  it  was  that  the  in- 
dividual substance  (ro£e  rt  6V),  vindicating  for  itself  more  fully 
the  role  of  subject,  was  called  by  Aristotle  ovaia  TrpwrTj,  sub- 
stantia  prima,  while  he  called  the  universal,  specific  or  generic 
substance,  ovaia  Sevrepa,  substantia  secunda}  These  are,  of 
course,  two  ways  of  regarding  substance,  and  not  two  really  dis- 
tinct species  of  substance  as  genus.  The  distinction  between  the 
membra  dividentia  is  logical,  not  real. 

The  perfectly  intelligible  sense  in  which  Aristotle  and  the  scholastics  de- 
signate the  universal  a  substance,  the  sense  of  moderate  realism,  according 
to  which  the  universal  constitutes,  and  is  identical  with,  the  essence  of  the  in- 
dividual "person"  or  "thing,"  is  entirely  different  from  the  sense  in  which 
many  exponents  of  modern  monistic  idealism  conceive  the  universal  as  the 
substance  par  excellence,  the  ens  realissimum,  determining,  expressing, 
evolving  itself  in  the  individual  phenomena  of  mind  and  of  nature,  which  would 
be  merely  its  manifestations.2 

(b)  The  divisions  of  substance  into  spiritual  and  corporeal,  of 
the  latter  into  inorganic  and  organic,  of  these  again  into  vegetative 
and  animal,  and  finally  of  animal  substances  into  brute  animals 
and  human  beings, — offer  no  special  difficulties.  All  purely 
natural  or  rational  knowledge  of  the  possibility  and  nature  of 
purely  spiritual  substances  is  based  on  the  analogy  of  our  know- 
ledge of  the  human  soul,  which,  though  a  spiritual  substance,  is 

1  ARISTOTLE,  Categ.  ch.  iii.,  passim ;  Metaph.,  1.  v.  (al.  vi.),  ch.  viii. ;  ST.  THOMAS, 
In  Metaph.,  1.  v.  lect.  10 ;  KLEUTQEN,  op.  cit.,  §  589-591. 
2C/.  KLEUTQEN,  op.  cit.,  §§  587,  602-603. 


254  ONTOLOGY 

not  a  pure  spirit,  but  is  naturally  allied  with  matter  in  its  mode  of 
existence.  The  individual  human  being  offers  to  human  ex- 
perience the  sole  example  of  the  sufficiently  mysterious  conjunc- 
tion and  combination  of  matter  and  spirit,  of  the  corporeal  mode 
of  being  and  the  spiritual  mode  of  being,  to  form  one  composite 
substance,  partly  corporeal  and  partly  spiritual. 

(c)  This  in  turn  suggests  the  division  of  substances  into  simple 
and  composite.     The  latter  are  those  which  we  understand  to  be 
constituted  by  the  natural  and  substantial  union  of  two  really 
distinct  but  incomplete  substantial  principles,   a  formative,  de- 
termining, specifying  principle,  and  a  material,  determinable,  in- 
different principle :   such  are  all  corporeal  substances  whether  in- 
organic, vegetative,  sentient,  or  rational.     The  former,  or  simple 
substances,  are  those  which  we  understand  to  be  constituted  by 
a  sole  and  single  substantial  principle  which   determines  and 
specifies  their  essence,  without  the  conjunction  of  any  material, 
determinable  principle.     We  have  no  direct  and  immediate  ex- 
perience of  any  complete  created  substance  of  this  kind  ;  but  each 
of  us  has  such  direct  experience  of  an  incomplete  simple  substance, 
viz.  his  own  soul ;  while  we  can  infer  from  our  experience  the 
existence  of  other  incomplete  simple  substances,  viz.  the  formative 
principles  of  corporeal  substances,  as  also  the  possibility  of  such 
complete  simple  substances  as  pure  spirits,  and  the  actual  ex- 
istence of  the  perfectly  simple,  uncreated  substance  of  the  Infinite 
Being. 

(d)  If  there  are  such  things  as  composite  substances,  i.e. 
substances  constituted  by  the  substantial   union  of  two   really 
distinct   principles,    then    it   follows    that  while   the   composite 
substance  itself  is  complete,  each   of  its  substantial  constitutive 
principles  is  incomplete.     Of  course  there  are  many  philosophers 
nowadays  who  reject  as  mere  mental  fictions,  as  products  of 
mere  logical  distinctions,  and  as  devoid  of  objective  validity,  the 
notions  of  composite  substance  and  incomplete  substance.     Nor  is 
this  to  be  wondered  at  when  we  remember  what  a  variety  of 
groundless   and    gratuitous    notions    are   current    in    regard    to 
substance  itself  (64).      But  understanding  substance  in  the  tra- 
ditional sense  already  explained  (62),  there  is  nothing  whatever 
inconsistent  in  the  notion   of  a  composite  substance,    or  of  an 
incomplete  substance, — provided  these  notions  are  understood  in 
the  sense  to  be  explained  presently.     Nay,  more,  not  only  are 
these  notions  intrinsically  possible :  we  must  even  hold  them  to 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  255 

be  objectively  valid  and  real,  to  be  truly  expressive  of  the  nature 
of  reality,  unless  we  are  prepared  to  hold  that  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  substantial  change  in  the  universe,  and  that  man  himself 
is  a  mere  aggregate  of  material  atoms  moved  according  to  me- 
chanical laws  and  inhabited  by  a  conscious  soul,  or  thinking 
principle,  rather  than  an  individual  being  with  one  definite 
substantial  nature. 

What,  then,  are  we  to  understand  by  complete  and  incomplete 
substances  respectively?  A  substance  is  regarded  as  complete 
in  the  fullest  sense  when  it  is  wanting  in  no  substantial  principle 
without  which  it  would  be  incapable  of  existing  and  discharging 
all  its  functions  in  the  actual  order  as  an  individual  of  some 
definite  species.  Of  course  no  created  substance  exists  or  dis- 
charges its  functions  unless  it  is  endowed  with  some  accidents, 
e.g.  with  properties,  faculties,  forces,  etc.  But  there  is  no  ques- 
tion of  these  here.  We  are  considering  only  the  essential  per- 
fections of  the  substance.  Thus,  then,  any  existing  individual  of 
any  species — a  man,  a  horse,  an  oak — is  a  complete  substance  in 
this  fullest  sense.  It  is  complete  in  the  line  of  substance,  in 
substantial  perfection,  "/»  ordine  substantialitatis"  inasmuch  as 
it  can  exist  (and  does  actually  exist)  without  being  conjoined  or 
united  substantially  with  any  other  substance  to  form  a  composite 
substance  other  than  itself.  And  it  is  complete  in  the  line  of 
specific  perfection,  "  in  ordine  speciei"  because  not  only  can  it  exist 
without  such  conjunction  with  any  other  substantial  principle,  but 
it  can  discharge  all  the  functions  natural  to  its  species,  and  thus 
tend  towards  \\sfinal  perfection  (47)  without  such  conjunction. 

But  it  is  conceivable  that  a  substance  might  be  complete  in 
the  line  of  substantial  perfections,  and  thus  be  capable  of  existing 
in  the  actual  order  and  discharging  there  some  of  the  functions  of 
its  species  without  conjunction  with  any  other  substantial  prin- 
ciple, and  yet  be  incapable  of  discharging  all  the  functions 
natural  to  an  individual  of  its  species  without  conjunction  with 
some  other  substantial  principle,  in  which  case  it  would  be  in- 
complete in  the  line  of  specific  perfection,  though  complete  in 
everything  pertaining  to  its  substantiality.  We  know  of  one 
such  substance, — the  human  soul.  Being  spiritual  and  immortal, 
it  can  exist  apart  from  the  body  to  which  it  is  united  by  nature, 
and  in  this  separated  condition  retain  and  exercise  its  spiritual 
faculties  of  intellect  and  will ;  it  is  therefore  complete  as  regards 
the  distinctively  substantial  perfection  whereby  it  is  "  capable  of 


256  ONTOLOGY 

existing  in  itself ".  But  being  of  its  nature  destined  for  union 
with  a  material  principle,  constituting  an  individual  of  the  human 
species  only  by  means  of  such  union,  and  being  capable  of  dis- 
charging some  of  the  functions  of  this  species,  viz.  the  sentient 
and  vegetative  functions,  only  when  so  united,  it  has  not  all  the 
perfections  of  its  species  independently  of  the  body ;  and  it  is 
therefore  an  incomplete  substance  in  the  line  of  specific  perfections, 
though  complete  in  those  essential  to  its  substantiality. 

Again,  if  it  be  true  that  just  as  man  is  composed  of  two 
substantial  principles,  soul  and  body,  so  every  living  thing  is 
composed  of  a  substantial  vital  principle  and  a  substantial 
material  principle,  and  that  every  inorganic  individual  thing  is 
likewise  composed  of  two  really  distinct  substantial  principles,  a 
formative  and  a  passive  or  material  principle ;  and  if,  furthermore, 
it  be  true  that  apart  from  the  spiritual  principle  in  man  every  other 
vital  or  formative  principle  of  the  composite  "  things  "  of  our 
experience  is  of  such  a  nature  that  it  cannot  actually  exist  except 
in  union  with  some  material  principle,  and  vice  versa, — then  it 
follows  necessarily  that  all  such  substantial  principles  of  these 
complete  composite  substances  are  themselves  incomplete  sub- 
stances :  and  incomplete  not  only  in  regard  to  perfections  which 
would  make  them  subsisting  individuals  of  a  species,  but  (unlike 
the  human  soul)  incomplete  even  in  the  line  of  substantiality 
itself,  inasmuch  as  no  one  of  them  is  capable  of  actually  existing 
at  all  except  in  union  with  its  connatural  and  correlative 
principle. 

Thus  we  arrive  at  the  notion  of  substances  that  are  incomplete 
in  the  line  of  specific  perfections,  or  in  that  of  substantial  per- 
fections, or  even  in  both  lines.  An  incomplete  substance,  there- 
fore, is  not  one  which  verifies  the  definition  of  substance  only  in 
part.  The  incomplete  substance  fully  verifies  the  definition  of  a 
substance.1  It  is  conjoined,  no  doubt,  with  another  to  form  a 
complete  substance ;  but  it  does  not  exist  in  the  other,  or  in  the 
composite  substance,  as  accidents  do.  It  is  a  substantial  principle 
of  the  composite  substance,  not  an  accidental  determination  of 
the  latter,  or  of  the  other  substantial  principle  with  which  it  is 
conjoined.  It  thus' verifies  the  notion  of  substance  as  a  mode  of 
being  which  naturally  exists  in  itself;  and  united  with  its  corre- 
lative substantial  principle  it  discharges  the  function  of  supporting 
all  accidental  determinations  which  affect  the  composite  sub- 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §§  277,  279. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  257 

stantial  essence.  Since,  however,  it  does  not  exist  itself  inde- 
pendently as  an  individual  of  a  species,  but  only  forms  the 
complete  individual  substance  by  union  with  its  correlative  sub- 
stantial principle,  it  may  be,  and  has  been,  accurately  described 
as  not  belonging  to  the  category  of  substance  formally,  but  only 
referentially ,  "  reductive  ". 

The  concepts  of  composite  substance,  of  complete  and  incom- 
plete substances,  understood  as  we  have  just  explained  them,  are 
therefore  perfectly  intelligible  in  themselves.  And  this  is  all  we 
are  concerned  to  show  in  the  present  context.  This  is  not  the 
place  to  establish  the  theses  of  psychology  and  cosmology  from 
which  they  are  borrowed.  That  the  human  soul  is  spiritual  and 
immortal ;  that  its  union  with  a  really  distinct  material  principle 
to  form  the  individual  human  substance  or  nature  is  a  sub- 
stantial union  ;  that  all  living  organisms  and  all  inorganic  bodies 
are  really  composite  substances  and  subject  to  substantial 
change :  these  various  theses  of  scholastic  philosophy  we  here 
assume  to  be  true.  And  if  they  are  true  the  conception  of  in- 
complete substances  naturally  united  to  form  a  complete  com- 
posite substance  is  not  only  intelligible  as  an  hypothesis  but  is 
objectively  true  and  valid  as  a  thesis  ;  and  thus  the  notion  of  an 
incomplete  substance  is  not  only  a  consistent  and  legitimate 
notion,  but  is  also  a  notion  which  gives  mental  expression  to  an 
objective  reality. 

We  may  add  this  consideration  :  The  concept  of  an  accident 
really  distinct  from  its  substance  involves  no  intrinsic  repug- 
nance. Yet  an  accident  is  a  mode  of  being  which  is  so  weak 
and  wanting  in  reality,  if  we  may  speak  in  such  terms,  that  it 
cannot  naturally  exist  except  by  inhering,  mediately  or  immedi- 
ately, in  the  stronger  and  more  real  mode  of  being  which  is  sub- 
stance. But  an  incomplete  substance  is  a  higher  grade  of  reality 
than  any  accident.  Therefore  if  accidents  can  be  real,  a  fortiori 
incomplete  substances  can  be  real. 

71.  SUBSTANCE  AND  NATURE.— We  have  already  pointed 
out  (13)  that  the  terms  "essence,"  "substance,"  and  "nature" 
denote  what  is  really  the  same  thing,  regarded  under  different 
aspects.  The  term  "  essence "  is  somewhat  wider  than  "  sub- 
stance," inasmuch  as  it  means  "what  a  thing  is,"  whether  the 
thing  be  a  substance,  an  accident,  or  a  concrete  existing  indi- 
vidual including  substance  and  accidents. 

The  traditional  meaning  of  the  term  "  nature  "  in  Aristotelian 


258  ONTOLOGY 

and  scholastic  philosophy  is  unmistakable.  It  means  the  essence 
or  substance  of  an  individual  person  or  thing,  regarded  as  the 
fundamental  principle  of  the  latter  s  activities.  Every  finite  in- 
dividual comes  into  existence  incomplete,  having  no  doubt  its 
essential  perfections  and  properties  actually,  but  its  intermediate 
and  final  perfections  only  potentially  (47).  These  it  realizes 
gradually,  through  the  exercise  of  its  connatural  activities. 
Every  being  is  essentially  intended  for  activity  of  some  sort : 
"  Omne  ens  est  propter  suam  operationem,"  says  St.  Thomas. 
And  by  the  constant  interplay  of  their  activities  these  beings 
realize  and  sustain  the  universal  order  which  makes  the  world  a 
cosmos.  There  is  in  all  things  an  immanent  purpose  or  finality 
which  enables  us  to  speak  of  the  whole  system  which  they  form 
as  "  Universal  Nature  "-1 

Therefore  what  we  call  a  substance  or  essence  from  the  static 
point  of  view  we  call  a  nature  when  we  consider  it  from  the 
dynamic  standpoint,  or  as  an  agent2  No  doubt  the  forces, 
faculties  and  powers,  the  active  and  passive  accidental  principles, 
whereby  such  an  agent  exerts  and  undergoes  action,  are  the 
proximate  principles  of  all  this  action  and  change,  but  the  remote 
and  fundamental  principle  of  the  latter  is  the  essence  or  substance 
of  the  agent  itself,  in  other  words  its  nature. 

Not  all  modern  scholastics,  however,  are  willing  thus  to  identify  nature 
with  substance.  We  have  no  intuitive  insight  into  what  any  real  essence  or 
substance  is  ;  our  knowledge  of  it  is  discursive,  derived  by  inference  from 
the  phenomena,  the  operations,  the  conduct  of  things,  in  accordance  with  the 
principle,  Operari  sequitur  esse.  Moreover,  the  actually  existing,  concrete 
individual — a  man,  for  instance — has  a  great  variety  of  activities,  spiritual, 
sentient,  vegetative,  and  inorganic  ;  he  has,  moreover,  in  the  constitution  of 
his  body  a  variety  of  distinct  organs  and  members  ;  he  assimilates  into  his 
body  a  variety  of  inorganic  substances  ;  the  tissues  of  his  body  appear  to  be 
different  in  kind;  the  vital  functions  which  subserve  nutrition,  growth  and 
reproduction  are  at  least  analogous  to  mechanical,  physical  and  chemical 
changes,  if  indeed  they  are  not  really  and  simply  such  ;  it  may  be,  therefore, 
that  the  ultimate  material  constituents  of  his  body  remain  substantially 
unaltered  in  their  passage  into,  and  through,  and  out  of  the  cycle  of  his 
vegetative  life  ;  that  they  retain  their  elemental  substantial  forms  while  they 
assume  a  new  nature  by  becoming  parts  of  the  one  organic  whole,  whose 
higher  directive  principle  dominates  and  co-ordinates  all  their  various 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  217  (pp.  66  sqq.). 

2  Sciendum  est  quod  nomen  naturae  significat  quodlibet  principium  intrinsicum 
motus  ;  secundum  quod  Philosophus  dicit  quod  natura  est  principium  motus  in  eo  in 
quo  est  per  se,  ft  now  secundum  accidens. — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol,,  iii.,  q.  2,  art.  i 
inc. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  259 

energies.1  If  this  be  so  there  is  in  the  same  individual  a  multiplicity  of 
really  and  actually  distinct  substances  ;  each  of  these,  moreover,  has  its  own 
existence  proportionate  to  its  essence,  since  the  existence  of  a  created  reality 
is  not  really  distinct  from  its  essence  ;  nor  is  there  any  reason  for  saying  that 
any  of  these  substances  is  incomplete  ;  what  we  have  a  right  to  say  is  that  no 
one  of  them  separately  is  a  complete  nature,  that  each  being  an  incomplete 
nature  unites  with  all  the  others  to  form  one  complete  nature :  inasmuch 
as  no  one  of  them  separately  is  an  adequate  intrinsic  principle  of  all  the 
functions  which  it  can  discharge,  and  is  naturally  destined  to  discharge,  by 
its  natural  union  with  the  others,  whereas  there  results  from  their  union  a 
new  fundamental  principle  of  a  co-ordinated  and  harmonized  system  of 
operations — in  a  word,  a  new  nature. 

This  line  of  thought  implies  among  other  things  (a}  the  view  that  whereas 
there  is  no  ground  for  admitting  the  existence  of  incomplete  substances,  there 
is  ground  for  distinguishing  between  complete  and  incomplete  natures ;  (6) 
the  view  that  from  the  union  or  conjunction  of  an  actual  multiplicity  of  sub- 
stances, each  remaining  unaltered  and  persisting  in  its  existence  actually 
distinct  from  the  others,  there  can  arise  one  single  complete  nature — a  nature 
which  will  be  one  being  simply  and  really,  unum  ens  per  se  et  simpliciter,  and 
not  merely  an  aggregate  of  beings  or  an  accidental  unity,  unum  per  accident, 
— and  there  does  arise  such  a  nature  whenever  the  component  substances  not 
merely  co-operate  to  discharge  certain  functions  which  none  of  them  could 
discharge  separately  (which  indeed  is  true  of  an  accidental  union,  as  of  two 
horses  drawing  a  load  which  neither  could  draw  by  itself),  but  when  they  unite 
in  a  more  permanent  and  intimate  way  according  to  what  we  call  "  natural 
laws "  or  "  laws  of  nature,"  so  as  to  form  a  new  fundamental  principle  of 
such  functions.2  These  views  undoubtedly  owe  their  origin  to  the  belief 
that  certain  facts  brought  to  light  by  the  physical  and  biological  sciences 
in  modern  times  afford  strong  evidence  that  the  elementary  material  con- 
stituents of  bodies,  whether  inorganic  or  living,  remain  substantially  unaltered 
while  combining  to  form  the  multitudinous  natural  kinds  or  natures  of  those 
living  or  non-living  material  things.  It  was  to  reconcile  this  supposed  plural- 
ity of  actually  distinct  and  diverse  substances  in  the  individual  with  the 
indubitable  real  unity  of  the  latter,  that  these  philosophers  distinguished 
between  substance  and  nature.  But  it  is  not  clear  that  the  facts  alleged 
afford  any  such  evidence.  Of  course  if  the  philosopher  approaches  the  con- 
sideration of  it  with  what  we  may  call  the  atomic  preconception  of  material 
substances  as  permanent,  unchangeable  entities,  this  view  will  preclude  all 
recognition  of  substantial  change  in  the  universe  ;  it  will  therefore  force  him 
to  conclude  that  each  individual,  composite  agent  has  a  unity  which  must  be 
less  than  substantial,  and  which,  because  he  feels  it  to  be  more  than  a  mere 
accidental  or  artificial  unity,  he  will  describe  as  natural,  as  a  union  to  form 
one  nature.  But  if  he  approach  the  evidence  in  question  with  the  view  that 
substantial  change  is  possible,  this  view,  involving  the  recognition  of  incom- 
plete substances  as  real,  will  remove  all  necessity  for  distinguishing  between 

1  And  here  we  are  reminded  of  the  view  of  many  medieval  scholastics  of  high 
authority,  that  the  same  material  entity  can  have  at  the  same  time  a  plurality  of 
formative  principles  or  substantial  forms  of  different  grades  of  perfection, 

3  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit,,  §  282  (p.  825). 

17* 


26o  ONTOLOGY 

substance  and  nature,  and  will  enable  him  to  conclude  that  however  various 
and  manifold  be  the  activities  of  the  individual,  their  co-ordination  and  uni- 
fication, as  proceeding  from  the  individual,  point  to  a  substantial  unity  in  the 
latter  as  their  fundamental  principle,  a  unity  resulting  from  the  union  of  in- 
complete substances. 

This  latter  is  undoubtedly  the  view  of  St.  Thomas,  of  practically  all  the 
medieval  scholastics,  and  of  most  scholastics  in  modern  times.  Nor  do  we 
see  any  sufficient  reason  for  receding  from  it,  or  admitting  the  modern  dis- 
tinction between  substance  and  nature.  And  if  it  be  objected  that  the  view 
which  admits  the  reality  of  incomplete  substances  and  substantial  change  is 
as  much  a  preconception  as  what  we  have  called  the  atomic  view  of  substance, 
our  answer  is,  once  more,  that  since  we  have  no  intellectual  intuition  into  the 
real  constitution  of  the  substances  which  constitute  the  universe,  since  we  can 
argue  to  this  only  by  observing  and  reasoning  from  their  activities  on  the 
principle  Operari  ^equitur  esse,  the  evidence  alone  must  decide  which  view  of 
these  substances  is  the  correct  one.  Does  the  evidence  afforded  us  by  a 
scientific  analysis  of  all  the  functions,  inorganic,  vegetative,  sentient  and 
rational,  of  an  individual  man,  forbid  us  to  conclude  that  he  is  one  complete 
substance,  resulting  from  the  union  to  two  incomplete  substantial  principles, 
a  spiritual  soul  and  a  material  principle  ?  and  at  the  same  time  compel  us  to 
infer  that  he  is  one  complete  nature  resulting  from  the  union  of  a  plurality  of 
principles  supposed  to  be  complete  as  substances  and  incomplete  as  natures  ? 
We  believe  that  it  does  not ;  nor  can  we  see  that  any  really  useful  purpose  is 
served  by  thus  setting  up  a  real  distinction  between  substance  and  nature. 
From  the  evidence  to  hand  it  is  neither  more  nor  less  difficult  to  infer  unity  of 
substance  than  unity  of  nature  in  the  individual.  The  inference  in  question 
is  an  inference  from  facts  in  the  phenomenal  order,  in  the  domain  of  the  senses, 
to  what  must  be  actually  there  in  the  noumenal  order,  in  the  domain  of 
nature  or  substance,  a  domain  which  cannot  be  reached  by  the  senses  but 
only  by  intellect.  Nor  will  any  imagination  images  which  picture  for  us  the 
physical  fusion  or  coalescence  of  material  things  in  the  domain  of  the  senses 
help  us  in  the  least  to  conceive  in  any  positive  way  the  mode  in  which  incom- 
plete natures  or  substances  unite  to  form  a  complete  nature  or  substance. 
For  these  latter  facts  belong  to  the  domain  which  the  senses  cannot  reach  at 
all,  and  which  intellect  can  reach  only  inferentially  and  not  by  direct 
insight. 

Hence  we  consider  the  view  which  regards  real  unity  of  nature  as  com- 
patible with  real  and  actual  plurality  of  complete  substances  in  the  individual,  as 
improbable.  At  the  same  time  we  do  not  believe  that  this  view  is  a  necessary 
corollary  from  the  real  identification  of  essence  with  existence  in  created 
things.  We  have  seen  that  even  if  accidents  have  their  own  existence  in  so  far 
as  they  have  their  own  essence — as  they  have  if  essence  and  existence  be  really 
identical — nevertheless  the  concrete  substance  as  determined  by  its  accidents 
can  have  a  really  unitary  existence,  unum  esse  corresponding  to  and  identical 
with  its  composite  constitution  (67).  Similarly,  if  the  existence  of  each  in- 
complete substance  is  identical  with  its  incomplete  essence,  this  is  no  obstacle 
to  the  complete  substance — which  results  from  the  union  of  two  such  incom- 
plete substantial  principles — having  one  complete  unitary  existence  identical 
with  its  composite  essence.  Hence  it  is  useless  to  argue  against  the  view  that 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  261 

a  plurality  of  actually  distinct  and  complete  substances  can  unite  to  form  a 
complete  nature  which  will  be  really  one  being^  on  the  ground  that  each 
complete  substance  has  already  its  own  existence  and  that  things  which  have 
and  preserve  their  own  existence  cannot  form  one  being.  Such  an  argument 
is  inconclusive  ;  for  although  one  being  has  of  course  only  one  existence,  it 
has  not  been  proved  that  this  one  existence  cannot  result  from  the  union  of 
many  incomplete  existences  :  especially  if  these  existences  be  identical  with 
the  incomplete  essences  which  are  admittedly  capable  of  uniting  to  form  one 
complete  essence. 

It  may>  however,  be  reasonably  urged  against  the  opinion  under  criti- 
cism that,  since  the  complete  substances  are  supposed  to  remain  complete  and 
unchanged  in  their  state  of  combination,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  this  com- 
bination can  be  a  real  union  and  not  merely  an  extrinsic  juxtaposition, — one 
which  remains  in  reality  a  merely  accidental  conjunction,  even  though  we 
may  dignify  it  with  the  title  of  a  "  natural  union  ". 

And  finally  it  may  be  pointed  out  that  in  this  view  the  operations  of  the 
individual  have  not  really  one  ultimate  intrinsic  principle  at  all,  since  behind 
the  supposed  unity  of  nature  there  is  a  more  fundamental  plurality  of 
actually  distinct  substances. 

72.  SUBSISTENCE  AND  PERSONALITY.— We  have  already 
examined  the  relation  between  the  individual  and  the  universal, 
between  first  and  second  substances,  in  connexion  with  the 
doctrine  of  Individuation  (31-3).  And  we  then  saw  that  what- 
ever it  be  that  individuates  the  universal  nature,  it  is  at  all  events 
not  to  be  regarded  as  anything  extrinsic  and  superadded  to  this 
nature  in  the  individual,  as  anything  really  distinct  from  this 
nature  :  that,  for  instance,  what  makes  Plato's  human  nature  to  be 
Plato's  is  not  anything  really  distinct  from  the  human  nature 
that  is  in  Plato.  We  have  now  to  fix  our  attention  on  the  nature 
as  individualized.  We  have  to  consider  the  complete  individual 
nature  or  substance  itself  in  actually  existing  individual  "  things  " 
or  "  persons  ". 

We  must  remember  that  scholastics  are  not  agreed  as  to 
whether  there  is  a  real  distinction  or  only  a  virtual  distinction 
between  the  actual  existence  and  the  complete  individual  essence 
or  substance  or  nature  of  created  individual  beings  (21-4). 
Furthermore  we  have  seen  that  philosophers  who  study  the  meta- 
physics of  the  inorganic  world  and  of  the  lower  forms  of  life  are 
unable  to  say  with  certainty  what  is  the  individual  in  these 
domains  :  whether  it  is  the  chemical  molecule  or  the  cRemical 
atom  or  the  electron  ;  whether  it  is  the  single  living  cell  or  the 
living  mass  consisting  of  a  plurality  of  such  cells  (31).  But  we 
have  also  seen  that  as  we  ascend  the  scale  of  living  things  all 


262  ONTOLOGY 

difficulty  in  designating  the  genuine  individual  disappears  :  that  a 
man,  a  horse,  an  oak  tree,  are  undoubtedly  individual  beings. 

Bearing  these  things  in  mind  we  have  now  to  inquire  into 
what  has  been  called  the  subsistence  or  personality  of  the  complete 
individual  substance  or  nature :  that  perfection  which  enables 
us  formally  to  designate  the  latter  a  "  subsisting  thing " J  or  a 
"  person  ".  By  personality  we  mean  the  subsistence  of  a  complete 
individual  rational  nature.  We  shall  therefore  inquire  into  the 
meaning  of  the  generic  term  subsistentia  (or  suppositalitas),  sub- 
sistence, in  the  abstract.  But  let  us  look  at  it  first  in  the  con- 
crete. 

A  complete  individual  nature  or  substance,  when  it  exists  in 
the  actual  order,  really  distinct  and  separate  in  its  own  complete 
entity  from  every  other  existing  being,  exercising  its  powers  and 
discharging  its  functions  of  its  own  right  and  according  to  the 
laws  of  its  own  being,  is  said  to  subsist,  or  to  have  the  perfection 
of  subsistence.  In  this  state  it  not  only  exists  in  itself  as  every 
substance  does ;  it  is  not  only  incommunicable  to  any  other 
being  as  every  individual  is,  in  contradistinction  with  second  or 
universal  substances  which  are,  as  such,  indefinitely  communic- 
able to  individuals ;  but  it  is  also  a  complete  whole,  incommunic- 
able as  a  mere  integral  or  essential  part  to  some  other  whole, 
unlike  the  incomplete  substantial  constituents,  or  integral  parts, 
members  or  organs  of,  say,  an  individual  organic  body ;  and 
finally  it  is  incommunicable  in  the  sense  that  it  is  not  capable  of 
being  assumed  into  the  subsisting  unity  of  some  other  superior 
"  suppositum  "  or  "  person  ".  All  those  characteristics  we  find 
in  the  individual  "  subsisting  thing  "  or  "  person  ".  It  "  exists 
in  itself"  and  is  not  communicable  to  another  substance \as  an 
accident,  because  it  is  itself  a  substance.  It  is  not  communicable 
to  individuals  as  a  universal,  because  it  is  itself  an  individual.  It 
is  not  communicable  as  an  integral  or  essential  part  to  a  whole, 
because  it  is  itself  a  complete  substance  and  nature.2  Finally  it 
is  not  communicable  to,  and  cannot  be  assumed  into,  the  unity  of 

1  For  want  of  a  more  appropriate  rendering  we  translate   the   Latin  term 
suppositum  (Gr.  vv6ffraffi.s)  by  the  phrase  "  subsisting  thing  "  ;  though  the  classical 
terms  are  really  generic  :  suppositum  being  a  genus  of  which  there  are  two  species, 
suppositum  irrationale  ("  thing  "  or  "  subsisting  thing  ")  and  suppositum  rationale 
("person"). — C/.  infra,  pp.  265-6. 

2  Complete  in   every  way :    in  substantial  and   in  specific   perfections.     The 
separated  soul,  though  it  is  an  existing  individual  substance,  retains  its  essential 
communicability  to  its  connatural  material  principle,  the  body.     Hence  it  has  not 
"  subsistence,"  it  is  not  a  "person  ". — Cf.  infra,  p.  264. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  263 

a  higher  personality  so  as  to  subsist  by  virtue  of  the  latter's 
subsistence,  because  it  has  a  perfection  incompatible  with  such 
assumption,  viz.  its  own  proper  subsistence,  whereby  it  is  already 
an  actually  subsisting  thing  or  person  in  its  own  right,  or  sui 
juris,  so  to  speak. 

The  mention  of  this  last  sort  of  incommunicability  would  be  superfluous, 
and  indeed  unintelligible,  did  we  not  know  from  Divine  Revelation  that  the 
human  nature  of  our  Divine  Lord  and  Saviour,  Jesus  Christ,  though  it  is  a 
complete  and  most  perfect  individual  nature,  is  nevertheless  not  a  person, 
because  It  is  assumed  into  the  Personality  of  the  Second  Person  of  the 
Divine  Trinity,  and,  united  hypostatically  or  personally  with  this  Divine 
Person,  subsists  by  virtue  of  the  Divine  Subsistence  of  the  latter. 

We  see,  therefore,  what  subsistence  does  for  a  complete 
individual  nature  in  the  static  order.  It  makes  this  nature  sui 
juris,  incommunicable,  and  entirely  independent  in  the  mode  of 
its  actual  being:  leaving  untouched,  of  course,  the  essential 
dependence  of  the  created  "  subsisting  thing  "  or  "  person  "  on 
the  Creator.  In  the  dynamic  order,  the  order  of  activity  and 
development,  subsistence  makes  the  complete  individual  nature 
not  only  the  ultimate  principle  by  which  all  the  functions  of  the 
individual  are  discharged,  but  also  the  ultimate  principle  or 
agent  which  exercises  these  functions  :  while  the  nature  as  such 
is  the  ultimate  principium  QUO,  the  nature  as  subsisting  is  the 
ultimate  principium  QUOD,  in  regard  to  all  actions  emanating 
from  this  nature.  Hence  the  scholastic  aphorism  :  Actiones  sunt 
suppositorum.  That  is,  all  actions  emanating  from  a  complete 
individual  nature  are  always  ascribed  and  attributed  to  the  latter 
as  subsisting,  to  the  "  subsisting  thing  "  or  "  person  ".  In  regard 
to  an  individual  human  person,  for  instance,  whether  his  intellect 
thinks,  or  his  will  resolves,  or  his  imagination  pictures  things,  or 
his  eyes  see,  or  his  hand  writes,  or  his  stomach  digests,  or  his 
lungs  breathe,  or  his  head  aches,  it  is  the  man,  ti\t  person,  pro- 
perly, that  discharges  or  suffers  all  these  functions,  though  by 
means  of  different  faculties,  organs  and  members ;  and  it  is  to 
him  properly  that  we  ascribe  all  of  them.1 

1 "  Per  se  agere  convenit  per  se  existenti.  Sed  per  se  existens  quandoque  potest 
dici  aliquid,  si  non  sit  inhaerens  ut  accidens,  vel  ut  forma  materialis,  etiamsi  sit 
pars.  Sed  proprie  et  per  se  subsistens  dicitur  quod  neque  est  praedicto  modo 
inhaerens  neque  est  pars.  Secundum  quem  modum  oculus  aut  manus  non  potest 
dici  per  se  subsistens,  et  per  consequens  nee  per  se  operans.  Unde  et  operationes 
partium  attribuuntur  toti  per  partes.  Dicimus  enim  quod  homo  videt  per  oculum  et 
palpat  per  manum." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  75,  art.  2,  ad.  2. 


264  ONTOLOGY 

Now  the  individual  human  person  is  neither  his  soul,  nor  his 
body,  nor  even  both  conceived  as  two ;  he  is  one  being,  one 
complete  substance  or  nature  composed  partly  of  a  spiritual 
principle  or  soul  and  partly  of  a  material  principle  which  the  soul 
"  informs  "  and  so  constitutes  a  living  human  body.  Hence  the 
human  soul  itself,  whether  we  consider  it  as  united  to  the  material 
principle  in  the  living  human  person,  or  as  disembodied  and 
separate  from  its  connatural  material  principle,  is  not  a  complete 
substance,  is  not  capable  of  subsisting  and  having  its  human 
activities  referred  ultimately  to  itself  as  the  subsisting,  personal 
principle  which  elicits  these  activities.  No  doubt  the  disembodied 
soul  has  actual  existence,  but  it  has  not  the  perfection  of  subsis- 
tence or  personality :  it  is  not  a  complete  individual  of  the  human 
species  to  which  it  belongs,  and  therefore  it  cannot  be  properly 
called  a  human  person,  a  complete  subsisting  individual  of  the 
human  species.1 

Furthermore,  even  though  an  individual  nature  be  complete  as  a  nature, 
endowed  with  all  the  substantial  and  specific  perfections  which  constitute  it  a 
complete  individual  of  the  species  to  which  it  belongs,  nevertheless  if  it  is 
assumed  into  the  personality  of  another  and  higher  nature,  and  subsists  in 
personal  union  with  the  latter  and  by  virtue  of  the  latter's  subsistence,  then 
that  nature,  not  having  its  own  proper  and  connatural  subsistence,  is  not  itself 
a  person.  Nor  can  the  actions  which  are  elicited  by  means  of  it  be  ascribed 
ultimately  to  it ;  they  must  be  ascribed  to  the  person  by  whose  subsistence 
it  subsists  and  into  whose  personality  it  has  been  assumed.  If  an  individual 
human  nature  be  thus  hypostatically  or  personally  assumed  into,  and  united 
with,  a  higher  Divine  Personality,  and  subsists  only  by  this  Personality,  such 
a  human  nature  will  be  really  and  truly  an  individual  nature  of  the  human 
species  ;  the  actions  elicited  through  it  and  performed  by  means  of  it  will  be 
really  and  truly  human  actions  ;  but  it  will  not  be  a  human  person  ;  while  its 
actions  will  be  really  and  truly  the  actions  of  the  Divine  Person,  and  will 
therefore  be  also  really  and  truly  divine :  they  will  be  ^the  actions  of  the 
God-Man,  divine  and  human,  theandric.  All  this  we  know  only  from  Divine 
Revelation  concerning  the  hypostatic  union  of  the  human  nature  of  Christ 
with  the  Person  of  the  Divine  Word  ;  nor  could  we  know  it  otherwise.  But 
all  this  does  not  modify,  it  only  supplements  and  completes,  what  the  light  of 
reason  discloses  to  us  regarding  the  subsistence  or  personality  of  any  complete 
individual  nature. 

1  C/.  preceding  note.  St.  Thomas  continues  :  "  Potest  igitur  dici  quod  anima 
intelligit,  sicut  oculus  videt,  sed  magis  proprie  dicitur  quod  homo  intelligat  per 
animam "  (ibid.) ;  and  elsewhere  he  writes :  "  Dicendum  quod  anima  est  pars 
humanae  specie!  [i.e.  naturae].  Et  ideo,  licet  sit  separata,  quia  tamen  retinet 
naturam  unibilitatis,  non  potest  dici  substantia  individua  quae  est  hypostasis  vel 
substantia  prima,  sicut  nee  manus,  nee  quaecumque  alia  partium  hominis ;  et  sic 
non  competit  ei  neque  definitio  personae,  nequenomen." — Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  29, 
art.  i,  ad.  5. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  265 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  give  nominal  definitions  of  sub- 
sistence and  personality  both  in  the  abstract  and  in  the  concrete, 
i.e.  definitions  which  will  indicate  to  us  what  exactly  it  is  that 
these  terms  denote,1  and  which  will  thus  enable  us  to  inquire 
into  their  connotation,  or  in  other  words  to  ask  what  is  it  precisely 
that  constitutes  subsistence  or  personality. 

By  "subsistence"  ("  subsistentia"  "  suppositalitas  ")  we  mean 
that  perfection  whereby  a  fully  complete  individual  nature  is 
rendered  in  every  way,  in  its  being  and  in  its  actions,  distinct 
from  and  incommunicable  to  any  and  every  other  being,  so  that 
it  exists  and  acts  sui  juris,  autonomously,  independently  of  every 
other  being  save  the  Creator.2 

By  a  "subsisting  being"  in  the  concrete  (vTroa-Tacri,?,  " sup- 
positum"  hypostasis],  we  mean  a  being  endowed  with  this  per- 
fection of  subsistence  ;  in  other  words,  a  being  that  is  a  complete 
individual  nature  existing  and  acting  in  every  way  distinct  from 
and  incommunicable  to  any  other  being,  so  that  it  exists  and 
acts  sui  juris p,  autonomously. 

"Personality"  is  simply  the  subsistence  of  a  complete  indi- 
vidual nature  that  is  rational,  intelligent. 

A  "person"  is  simply  a  subsisting  nature  that  is  rational, 
intelligent:  Persona  est  suppositum  rationale.  The  definition 
given  by  Boetius  is  classic :  ' '  Persona  est  substantia  individua 
RATION  ALIS  naturae  "  :  "  the  individual  substance  of  a  rational 
nature," — where  the  term  individual  is  understood  to  imply 
actually  existing  and  subsisting. 

The  special  name  which  has  thus  been  traditionally  applied 
to  rational  or  intelligent  subsisting  beings  (as  distinct  from 
animals,  plants,  and  material  " things") — the  term  "person" 
^persona"  a  mask  \per-sonus  ;  cf.  Gr.  TrpoacoTreiov,  from  Trpoo-coTrov, 
the  face,  countenance) — originally  meaning  a  r61e  or  character 
in  a  drama,  came  to  be  applied  to  the  subsisting  human  indi- 
vidual, and  to  connote  a  certain  dignity  of  the  latter  as  compared 
with  the  lower  or  non-rational  beings  of  the  universe.  And  in 
fact  the  ascription  of  its  actions  to  the  subsisting  being  is 
more  deeply  grounded  in  the  subsistence  of  rational,  intelligent 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §§  54-5. 

2  All  created  subsisting  things  and  persons  depend,  of  course,  essentially  on  the 
Necessary  Being  for  their  existence  and  for  their  activity.     This  Necessary  Being 
we  know  from  Revelation  to  be  Triune,  Three  in  Persons,  One  in  Nature.     The 
subsistence  of  each  Divine  Person  of  the  Blessed  Trinity  excludes  all  modes  of 
dependence. 


266  ONTOLOGY 

beings,  who,  as  free  agents,  can  more  properly  direct  and  control 
these  actions.1 

73.  DISTINCTION  BETWEEN  THE  INDIVIDUAL  NATURE  AND 
ITS  SUBSISTENCE.  WHAT  CONSTITUTES  PERSON ALITY  ?— Know- 
ing now  what  we  mean  by  the  terms  "subsistence,"  "sup- 
positum,"  "  person,"  and  "  personality,"  we  have  next  to  inquire 
in  what  l precisely  does  subsistence  consist.  What  is  it  that 
constitutes  a  complete  individual  nature  a  "  subsisting  being,"  or 
if  the  nature  be  rational,  a  "person"?  Subsistence  connotes, 
over  and  above  the  mode  of  "existing  in  itself"  which 
characterizes  all  substance,  the  notion  that  the  substance  or 
nature  is  individual,  that  it  is  complete,  that  it  is  in  every  way 
incommunicable,  that  it  is  sui  juris  or  autonomous  in  its 
existence  and  activities.  These  notions  are  all  positive;  they 
imply  positive  perfections :  even  incommunicability  is  really  a 
positive  perfection  though  the  term  is  negative.  But  is  any  one 
of  the  positive  perfections,  thus  contained  in  the  notion  of  sub- 
sistence, a  positive  something  over  and  above,  and  really  distinct 
from,  the  perfection  already  implied  in  the  concept  of  a  complete 
individual  nature  as  such  ? 

Some  of  those  philosophers  who  regard  the  distinction  be- 
tween essence  and  existence  in  creatures  as  a  real  distinction, 
identify  the  subsistence  of  the  complete  individual  nature  with  its 
actual  existence,  thus  placing  a  real  distinction  between  nature 
and  subsistence  or  personality.2  Apart  from  these,  however,  it 
is  not  likely  that  any  philosophers,  guided  by  the  light  of  reason 
alone,  would  ever  have  held,  or  even  suspected,  that  the  sub- 
sistence of  an  actually  existing  individual  nature  is  a  positive 
perfection  really  distinct  from,  and  superadded  to,  the  latter. 
For  we  never,  in  our  natural  experience,  encounter  an  existing 
individual  substance,  or  nature,  or  agent,  that  is  not  distinct, 
autonomous,  independent,  sui  juris,  and  incommunicable  in  its 
mode  of  being  and  acting. 

Rigorously,  however,  this  would  only  prove  that  subsistence  is  a  perfec- 
tion naturally  inseparable  from  the  complete  individual  nature  ;  conceivably 

1 "  Hoc  .  .  .  quod  est  per  se  agere,  excellentiori  modo  convenit  substantiis 
rationales  naturae  quam  aliis.  Nam  solae  substantiae  rationales  habent  dominium 
sui  actus,  ita  quod  in  eis  est  agere  et  non  agere ;  aliae  vero  substantiae  magis 
aguntur  quam  agunt.  Et  ideo  conveniens  fuit  ut  substantia  individua  rationalis 
naturae  speciale  nomen  haberet." — ST.  THOMAS,  Quaest.  Disp.  de  Potentia,  q.  ix., 
art.  i,  ad.  3. 

2C/.  BILLOT,  De  Verbo  Incarnate,  q.  n.—apud  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  151  (pp. 
299-300). 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  267 

it  might  still  be  really  distinct  from  the  latter.  But  whether  or  not  such 
real  distinction  could  be  suspected  by  the  unaided  light  of  reason  working  on 
natural  experience,  at  all  events  what  we  know  from  Divine  Revelation  con- 
cerning the  hypostatic  union  of  the  human  nature  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ 
with  the  Person  of  the  Divine  Word,  enables  us  to  realize  that  there  can  be, 
in  the  actual  order  of  things,  a  complete  individual  nature  which  is  not  a 
"  subsisting  being  "  or  "  person  "  ;  for  the  human  nature  of  our  Lord  is  de 
facto  such  a  nature, — and  ab  actu  ad  posse  valet  consecutio.  This  informa- 
tion, however,  is  not  decisive  in  determining  the  character  of  the  distinction 
between  the  individual  substance  or  nature  and  its  subsistence. 

It  may  be  that  the  complete  individual  nature  is  eo  ipso  and 
identically  a  "  subsisting  being  "  or  "  person,"  that  it  is  always  inde- 
pendent, autonomous,  sui  juris,  by  the  very  fact  that  it  is  a  com- 
plete individual  nature,  unless  it  is  DE  FACTO  assumed  into  the 
personality  of  a  higher  nature,  so  that  in  this  intercommunication 
with  the  latter,  in  the  unity  of  the  latter's  personality,  it  is  not 
independent,  autonomous,  sui  juris,  but  dependent,  subordinate, 
and  alterius  juris.  In  this  condition,  it  loses  nothing  positive  by 
the  fact  that  it  is  not  now  a  person  and  has  not  its  own  subsis- 
tence; nor  does  it  gain  any  natural  perfection,  for  it  was  ex 
hypothesi  complete  and  perfect  as  a  nature ;  but  it  gains  some- 
thing supernatural  inasmuch  as  it  now  subsists  in  a  manner  wholly 
undue  to  it.1  According  to  this  view,  therefore,  subsistence  would 
not  be  a  perfection  really  distinct  from  the  complete  individual 
nature ;  it  would  be  a  mentally  distinct  aspect  of  the  latter,  a 
positive  aspect,  however,  consisting  in  this  nature's  completeness, 
its  self-sufficing,  autonomous  character,  and  consequent  incom- 
municability.2 

The  principal  difficulty  against  this  view  is  a  theological  difficulty.  As 
formulated  by  Urraburu,3  it  appears  to  involve  an  ambiguity  in  the  expression 
"  substantial  union  ".  It  is  briefly  this  :  If  the  subsistence  proper  to  a  com- 
plete individual  nature  adds  no  positive  perfection  to  the  latter,  so  that  the 
latter  necessarily  subsists  and  is  a  person  unless  it  is  actually  assumed  into  a 
higher  personality,  and  by  the  very  fact  that  it  is  not  actually  so  assumed, 
then  the  human  nature  of  Christ  "  is  as  complete  in  every  way  and  in  every 
line  of  substantial  perfection,  by  virtue  of  its  own  proper  entity,  when  actually 
united  with  the  Divine  Person,  as  it  would  be  were  it  not  so  united,  or  as 

lCf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.t  §  291,  for  an  exhaustive  list  of  the  authorities  in 
favour  of  each  of  the  various  views  propounded  in  this  present  context. 

2"Natura  singularis  et  integra  per  se  consituitur  in  sua  independentia,  non 
aliquo  positive  addito  ultra  illam  entitatem  positivam,  qua  est  haec  natura." — SCOTUS, 
Hi.,  Dist.  i.  q.  i,  n.  9  and  n.  n,  ad.  3.  Cf.  SUAREZ,  Metaph.,  Disp.  xxxiv.  §2; 
KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  616 ;  FRANZELIN,  De  verbo  Incarnato,  Th.  xxix. 

3 op.  cit.,  §293  (p.  861). 


268  ONTOLOGY 

the  person  of  Peter,  or  Paul,  or  any  other  human  person  is  ".  But  this  im- 
plies that  there  are  in  Christ  "  two  substances  complete  in  every  respect ". 
Now  between  two  such  substances  "  there  cannot  be  a  substantial  union," 
a  union  which  would  constitute  "one  being,"  "unum  per  se  ens".  Hence 
the  view  in  question  would  appear  to  be  inadmissible. 

But  it  is  not  proved  that  the  union  of  "  two  substances  complete  in  every 
respect "  cannot  result  in  the  constitution  of  a  being  that  is  really  and  genu- 
inely one — 4<  unum  per  se  ens  " —  in  the  case  in  which  the  union  is  apersonal 
union.  The  hypostatic  union  of  the  human  nature  of  Christ  with  the  Divine 
Person  is  primarily  a  personal  union  whereby  the  former  nature  subsists  by  and 
in  the  Divine  Personality.  It  has  the  effect  of  constituting  the  united  terms  "  one 
subsisting  being,"  and  therefore  has  supereminently,  if  not  formally,  the  effect  of 
a  "  substantial  union  ".  Nay,  it  is  a  "  substantial  "  union  in  the  sense  that  it 
is  a  union  of  two  substances,  not  of  a  substance  and  accidents  ;  and  also 
in  the  sense  that  it  is  not  a  mere  accidental  aggregation  or  artificial  juxta- 
position of  substances,  resulting  merely  in  the  constitution  of  collective  or 
artificial  unity,  a  unum  per  accidens.  But  is  it  a  "  substantial "  union  in  the 
sense  that  it  is  such  a  union  of  substances  as  results  in  one  "  nature  "  ? 
Most  certainly  not ;  for  this  was  the  heresy  of  the  Monophysites  :  that  in 
Christ  there  is  only  one  nature  resulting  from  the  union  of  the  human  nature 
with  the  Divine.  If  then,  with  Urraburu,  we  mean  by  "nature"  simply 
"substance  regarded  as  a  principle  of  action  "  (71),  and  if,  furthermore,  the 
hypostatic  union  does  not  result  in  one  "nature,"  neither  does  it  result  in  one 
"substance,"  nor  can  it  be  a  "  substantial  "  or  "natural  "  union  in  this  sense.1 
He  does  not  say,  of  course,  that  the  hypostatic  union  is  a  "  substantial  union  " 
which  results  in  "one  nature,"  or  even  explicitly  that  it  results  in  "one  sub- 
stance," but  he  says  that  the  two  substances  are  "  substantially  conjoined," 
"  substantialiter  conjunguntur  "  ;  and  he  continues,  "a  substantial  union  is 
such  a  conjunction  of  two  substantial  realities  that  there  results  from  it  one 
substantial  something,  which  is  truly  and  properly  one  " — "  unio  enim  sub- 
stantialis,  est  talis  duarum  rerum  substantialium  conjunctio,  per  quam  resultat 
unum  aliquid  substantiale  quod  vere  et  proprie  sit  unum,"  2 — and  he  concludes 
that  "  there  is  something  substantial  wanting  in  the  human  nature  of  Christ,  viz. 
personality,  which,  of  course,  is  most  abundantly  supplied  in  the  hypostatic  union 
by  the  Divine  Person  " — "reliquum  est,  ut  naturae  humanae  in  Christo  aliquid 
desit  substantiale,  nempe  personalitas,  quod  per  unionem  hypostaticam  cumul- 
atissime  suppleatur  a  Verbo."3  Now,  this  "  aliquid  substantiale"  cannot  be 
"  aliquid  naturale  "  in  the  sense  that  it  is  something  constitutive  of  the  human 

1  Neither  is  it  a  natural  union  in  the  sense  of  being  due  to  the  human  nature  ; 
it  is  wholly  undue  to  the  latter,  and  is  in  this  sense  supernatural. 

*op.cit.,  §  293  (p.  861). 

3  ibid.  Farther  on  (p.  863)  he  says  it  is  certain  that  the  Divine  Nature  of  the 
Word  is  substantially  united  with  humanity  in  a  unity  of  person  or  subsistence : 
"certum  est  eamdem  [naturam  divinam]  substantialiter  uniri  cum  humanitate  in 
unitate  suppositi ;  "  and  for  this  he  considers  that  the  human  nature  must  be  incom- 
plete "  in  ratione  personae  ".  But  this  proves  nothing ;  for  of  course  the  human 
nature  must  be  wanting  in  personality.  But  it  is  complete  as  a  nature.  Nor  does 
the  aphorism  he  quotes — "  Quidquid  substantiae  in  sua  specie  completae  accedit, 
accidens  est," — apply  to  subsistence  or  personality  supervening  on  a  complete 
substance. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  269 

substance  or  nature  ;  for  the  human  substance  or  nature  of  Christ  is  certainly 
complete  and  perfect  as  a  substance  or  nature.  It  must  be  some  complement 
or  mode,  that  is  naturally  due  to  it,  but  supernaturally  supplied  by  the  Person  of 
the  Divine  Word.1  This  brings  us  to  the  view  that  subsistence  is  a  something 
positive,  distinct  in  some  real  way,  and  not  merely  in  our  concepts,  from  the 
complete  individual  substance. 

According  to  the  more  common  view  of  catholic  philosophers 
(and  theologians)  subsistence  is  some  positive  perfection  really 
distinct  from  the  complete  individual  nature.  But  the  supporters 
of  this  general  view  explain  it  in  different  ways.  We  have  al- 
ready referred  to  the  view  of  certain  Thomists  who,  identifying 
subsistence  with  the  actual  existence  of  the  complete  substance  or 
nature,  place  a  real  distinction  between  the  existence  and  the  sub- 
stance or  nature.  Other  Thomists,  while  defending  the  latter  dis- 
tinction, point  out  that  actual  existence  confers  no  real  perfection, 
but  only  actualizes  the  real ;  they  hold,  therefore,  that  subsistence 
is  not  existence,  but  is  rather  a  perfection  of  the  real,  essential,  or 
substantial  order,  as  distinct  from  the  existential  order — a  per- 
fection presupposed  by  actual  existence,  and  whose  proper  function 
is  to  unify  all  the  substantial  constituents  and  accidental  deter- 
minations of  the  individual  substance  or  nature,  thus  making  it  a 
really  unitary  being — "  unum  ens  per  se  " — proximately  capable 
of  being  actualized  by  the  simple  existential  act  :  which  latter 
is  the  ultimate  actuality  of  the  real  being  :  esse  est  ultimus  actus* 

The  concrete  individual  nature,  containing  as  it  does  a  plur- 
ality  of  really  distinct  principles,  substantial  and  accidental,  needs 
some  unifying  principle  to  make  these  one  incommunicable  re- 
ality, proximately  capable  of  receiving  a  corresponding  unitary 
existential  act :  without  such  a  principle,  they  say,  each  of  the 
substantial  and  accidental  principles  in  the  concrete  individual 
nature  would  have  its  own  existence  :  so  that  the  result  would  be 
not  really  one  being,  but  a  being  really  manifold  and  only  ac- 
cidentally one — "  unum  per  accidens  ".  This  principle  is  subsis- 
tence. 

The  human  nature  of  our  Divine  Lord  has  not  its  own  connatural  sub- 
sistence ;  this  is  supplied  by  the  subsistence  of  the  Divine  Person.  More- 
over, since  the  human  nature  in  question  has  not  its  own  subsistence, 
neither  has  it  its  own  existence ;  existence  is  the  actuality  of  the  subsisting 

1  "  Humanitas  ilia  [scil.  Christi],  quamvis  completa  in  esse  naturae,  non  tamen 
habet  ultimum  complementum  in  genere  substantiae  cum  in  se  non  subsistat." — ibid., 
§  296  (p.  866). 

2  This  view,  which   has  many  supporters,  is  clearly  explained  and  ably  defended 
by  MERCIER  in  his  Ontologie,  §  151  (pp.  298-302),  §  52  (pp.  134-5),  §  49  (p.  127,  n.  i). 


270  ONTOLOGY 

being  ;  therefore  there  is  in  Christ  but  one  existence,  that  of  the  Divine  Person, 
whereby  also  the  human  nature  of  Christ  exists.1 

Of  those  who  deny  that  the  distinction  between  the  existence 
and  the  essence  of  any  created  nature  is  a  real  distinction,  some 
hold  in  the  present  matter  the  Scotist  view  that  subsistence  is  not 
a  positive  perfection  really  distinct  from  the  complete  individual 
nature.  Others,  however,  hold  what  we  have  ventured  to  regard 
as  the  more  common  view  :  that  personality  is  something  positive 
and  really  distinct  from  nature.  But  they  explain  what  they 
conceive  subsistence  to  be  without  any  reference  to  existence, 
and  without  distinguishing  between  the  essential  and  the  exis- 
tential order  of  reality. 

The  most  common  explanation  seems  to  be  that  subsistence 
is  a  unifying  principle  of  the  concrete  individual  nature,  as  stated 
above.  Thus  conceived,  it  is  not  an  absolute  reality ;  nor  is  the 
distinction  between  it  and  the  nature  a  major  real  distinction.  It 
is  a  substantial  mode  (68),  naturally  superadded  to  the  substance 
and  modally  distinct  from  the  latter.  It  so  completes  and  deter- 
mines the  substance  or  nature  that  the  latter  not  only  exists  in  it- 
self but  is  also,  by  virtue  of  this  mode,  incommunicable  in  every 
way  and  sui  juris?  It  gives  to  the  substance  that  ultimate  deter- 
minateness  which  an  accidental  mode  such  as  a  definite  shape  or 
location  gives  to  the  accident  of  quantity.3 

This  mode  is  absent  (supernaturally)  from  the  human  nature  of  our  Divine 
Lord  ;  this  nature  is  therefore  communicable ;  and  the  Personality  of  the 
Divine  Word  supernaturally  supplies  the  function  of  this  absent  natural 
mode. 

It  must  be  confessed  that  it  is  not  easy  to  understand  how 
this  or  any  other  substantial  mode  can  be  really  distinct  from  the 
substance  it  modifies.  And  in  truth  the  distinction  is  not  real  in 
the  full  sense  :  it  is  not  between  thing  and  thing  >  inter  rem  et  rem. 
All  that  is  claimed  for  it  is  that  it  is  not  merely  mental ;  that  it  is 
not  merely  an  ens  rationis  which  the  mind  projects  into  the  reality ; 

1  Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  49  (p.  127,  n.  i). 

2  Hence  Urraburu  gives  thisraiZ  definition  of  subsistence :  ultimus  naturae  ter- 
minus in  ordine  substantiate,  sive  in  ratione  existentis  per  se :  the  ultimate  term  (or 
determination)  of  a  nature  in  the  order  of  substantiality  or  of  "  existing  by  itself  " — 
op.  cit.,  §  296  (p.  866). 

3  "  Sicut  enim  modus  accidentalis  figurae  terminat  quantitatem,  et  modus  ubi- 
cationis  constituit  rem  hie  et  non  alibi,  ita  modus  substantialis  personalitatis  termi- 
nans  naturam  reddit  illam  incommunicabilem  alieno  supposito." — URRABURU,  op. 
cit.,  §  291  (p.  854). 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  271 

that  it  is  a  positive  perfection  of  the  nature  or  substance,  a  perfec- 
tion which,  though  naturally  inseparable  from  the  latter,  is  not 
absolutely  inseparable,  and  which,  therefore,  is  de  facto  superna- 
turally  absent  from  the  human  nature  and  replaced  by  the  Divine 
Personality  in  the  case  of  the  hypostatic  union. 

It  belongs,  moreover,  to  the  order  of  substance,  not  to  that 
of  accidents :  the  substantial  mode  differs  from  the  accidental 
mode,  or  modal  accident,  in  this,  that  it  gives  to  the  substance 
some  ultimate  determining  perfection  which  appertains  to  the 
substance  as  such,  and  whereby  the  substance  is  completed  in  the 
order  of  "  existing  in  itself".  Subsistence  is  not  an  accident,  even 
though  it  supervenes  on  the  complete  nature,  for  it  determines  the 
substance  of  the  latter,  not  in  relation  to  any  line  of  accidental 
activity,  as  a  power  or  faculty,  nor  as  something  modifying  it  ac- 
cidentally, but  as  a  mode  which  ultimately  determines  and  perfects 
it  in  the  order  of  substantial  reality  itself,  in  the  order  of  "  existing 
in  itself"  in  such  a  full  and  perfect  manner  as  to  be  sui  juris  and 
incommunicable. 

The  main  difficulty  against  this  view  is  also  theological:  If  subsistence 
is  a  positive  perfection  it  either  belongs  to  the  complete  individual  nature  or 
it  does  not ;  in  the  former  case  the  humanity  of  Christ,  assumed  by  the  Divine 
Word,  was  not  a  complete  human  nature  ;  in  the  latter  case  the  individual 
human  nature  can  exist  without  it :  and  both  consequences  are  equally  in- 
admissable.  But  it  may  be  replied  that,  granting  the  first  member  of  the 
disjunctive,  the  consequence  inferred  from  it  does  not  really  follow  :  subsistence 
belongs  to  the  complete  individual  nature  as  an  ultimate  natural  complement ; 
but  when  it  is  absent  and  supplied  supernaturally  by  the  Divine  Personality 
the  nature  is  still  complete  as  a  nature  :  it  is  wanting  in  no  absolute  or  enti- 
tative  perfection,  but  only  in  a  modality  which  is  supereminently  supplied  by 
the  Divine  Personality.  Neither  is  the  consequence  from  the  second  member 
of  the  disjunctive  a  valid  inference.  For  though  personality  as  a  mode  does 
not  belong  to  the  essence  of  an  individual  human  nature,  no  such  individual 
nature  can  exist  without  some  personality,  either  its  own  or  another  :  just  as 
extension  cannot  exist  without  some  shape,  though  any  particular  shape  is  not 
essential  to  it. 

To  sum  up,  then,  the  doctrine  of  the  two  preceding  sections : 
What  are  we  to  understand  by  a  person,  and  by  personality  ? 
Unquestionably  our  conception  of  person  and  personality  (concrete 
and  abstract)  is  mainly  determined,  and  very  rightly  so,  by 
an  analysis  of  what  constitutes  the  actually  existing  individual 
of  the  human  species.  Whatever  our  concept  be,  it  must  certainly 
be  realized  and  verified  in  all  human  individuals  :  these,  before  all 
other  beings,  must  be  included  in  the  denotation.  Q(  Qur  concept 


272  ONTOLOGY 

of  person.  In  fact,  for  the  philosopher,  guided  by  the  natural 
light  of  reason  alone,  the  term  can  have  hardly  any  other  con- 
notation. He  will,  no  doubt,  ascribe  personality,  as  the  highest 
mode  of  being  he  knows  of,  to  the  Supreme  Being ;  but  he  will 
here  ascribe  it  only  in  an  analogical  and  supereminent  way  ; 
and  only  from  Divine  Revelation  can  he  know  that  this  Supreme 
Being  has  not  a  single  but  a  threefold  Personality.  Again,  his 
consideration  of  the  nature  of  the  human  soul  as  an  embodied 
substance  which  is  nevertheless  spiritual  and  immortal  will  enable 
him  to  affirm  the  possibility  of  purely  spiritual  created  beings ; 
and  these  he  will  of  course  conceive  as  persons.  But,  conceiving 
the  human  soul  itself  as  a  constituent  principle  of  the  human 
individual,  he  will  not  conceive  the  soul  itself  as  a  person. 

The  philosopher  who  understands  the  traditional  Aristotelian 
conceptions  of  substance,  of  individual  substance  (substantia 
primd),  of  incomplete,  complete,  and  composite  substances,  of 
substance  considered  as  nature  or  principle  of  action,  of  substance 
considered  as  hypostasis,  as  the  actually  existing  individual 
being  which  is  the  ultimate  logical  subject  of  all  predications  and 
the  ultimate  ontological  subject  of  all  real  determinations :  the 
philosopher  who  understands  these  concepts,  and  who  admits 
them  to  be  validly  grounded  in  experience,  and  to  offer  as  far  as 
they  go  a  correct  interpretation  of  reality,  will  have  no  difficulty 
in  making  up  his  mind  about  what  is  requisite  to  constitute  a 
person. 

Wherever  he  finds  an  existing  individual  being  of  any  species, 
a  being  which,  even  if  it  is  really  composite,  is  nevertheless  really 
one,  such  a  being  he  will  pronounce  to  be  a  "  subsisting  individual 
being  ".  He  may  not  be  able,  in  the  inorganic  world  or  among 
the  lower  forms  of  life,  to  distinguish  for  certain  what  is  the  real 
individual  from  what  may  be  perhaps  only  an  accidental,  if 
natural,  colony  or  group  of  real  individuals.  As  a  test  he  will 
always  seek  for  the  manifestation  of  an  internal  directive  principle 
whereby  all  the  vital  functions  of  the  organized  mass  of  matter  in 
question  are  co-ordinated  in  such  a  manner  as  to  make  for  the 
preservation,  growth  and  development  of  the  whole  throughout 
a  definite  life  cycle  from  birth  to  death.  This  formative  and 
directive  principle  is  evidence  of  an  individual  unity  of  nature  and 
subsistence  ;  and  such  evidence  is  abundantly  present  in  "  indi- 
viduals "  of  all  the  higher  species  in  botany  and  zoology.  The 
"individual  subsisting  being"  will  therefore  be  a  " complete 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  273 

individual  substance  or  nature,  existing  and  acting  in  every  way 
distinct  from  and  incommunicable  to  any  other  being,  so  that  it 
exists  and  acts  sui  juris,  autonomously  ". 

If  such  an  individual  nature  is  not  merely  corporeal  but  organic 
or  animate,  not  merely  animate  but  sentient,  and  not  merely 
sentient  but  rational  or  intelligent,  i.e.  constituted  at  least  in  part  by 
a  spiritual  substantial  principle  whereby  the  individual  is  intelligent 
and  free,  then  that  individual  is  a  person.  Every  individual  of  the 
human  species  is  such.  And  all  that  is  essential  to  his  complete 
individual  human  nature  enters  into  and  constitutes  his  person  in 
the  concrete.  Not  merely,  therefore,  his  intellect  and  will ;  not 
merely  his  soul  considered  as  "  mind,"  i.e.  as  the  basis  and 
principle  of  his  whole  conscious  and  subconscious  psychic  life ; 
or  also  as  the  principle  of  his  merely  organic  life ;  or  also  as  the 
actualizing  principle  of  his  corporeal  nature ;  but  no  less  also  the 
corporeal  principle  itself  of  his  composite  being,  the  body  itself  with 
all  its  parts  and  members  and  organs  :  all  these  without  exception 
belong  equally  to  the  human  person  ;  all  of  them  without  excep- 
tion go  to  constitute  the  Ego.1  This,  which  is  the  Aristotelian 
and  scholastic  view  of  the  human  person,  is  in  perfect  accord  with 
the  common-sense  view  of  the  matter  as  evidenced  by  the  ordinary 
usages  of  language.  We  speak  intelligibly  no  less  than  correctly 
when  we  say  that  a  man's  body  is  part  of  his  person  as  well  as 
his  soul  or  mind.  And  we  make  a  no  less  accurate,  intelligible, 
and  necessary  distinction,  when  we  distinguish  between  all  that 
which  constitutes  the  human  person  and  that  whereby  we  know 
ourselves  and  other  human  individuals  to  be  persons.  Yet  this 
distinction  is  not  kept  clearly  in  mind  by  many  modern  philo- 
sophers, who,  approaching  the  study  of  personality  exclusively 
from  the  side  of  what  the  individual  consciousness  testifies  as  to 
the  unity  and  continuity  (or  otherwise)  of  mental  life  in  the 
individual,  are  scandalized  at  the  assertion  that  the  human  body 
can  have  anything  to  do  with  human  personality. 

74.  CONSCIOUSNESS  OF  THE  PERSONAL  SELF.— In  order  to 
form  the  concept  of  person,  and  to  find  that  concept  verified  in 
the  data  of  our  experience,  it  is  absolutely  essential  that  we  be 
endowed  with  the  faculty  of  intelligence,  the  spiritual  power  of 
forming  abstract  concepts ;  and  secondly,  that  having  formed 

1  The  terms  "  Self,"  '« Ego''  and  "  Person  "  we  take  to  be  identical  in  reference 
to  the  human  individual.  The  mind  is  not  the  Ego,  self,  or  person,  but  only  a  part 
of  it. — Cf.  MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  vi.,  p.  104. 

18 


274  ONTOLOGY 

the  concept  of  person  as  a  "  rational  or  intelligent  subsisting 
being,"  we  be  capable,  by  the  exercise  of  reflex  consciousness,  to 
find  in  our  own  mental  life  the  data  from  which  we  can  conclude 
that  this  concept  of  person  is  verified  in  each  and  every  one  of 
ourselves.  It  is  because  we  are  endowed  with  intelligence  that 
we  can  form  all  the  abstract  notions — of  substance,  individual, 
subsistence,  existence,  etc., — which  enter  into  and  constitute  our 
concept  of  person.  And  it  is  because  we  can,  by  means  of  this 
faculty,  reflect  on  our  own  mental  operations,  and  infer  from 
them  that  each  of  us  is  a  complete  individual  rational  nature  sub- 
sisting independently  and  incommunicably,  that  we  can  know 
ourselves  to  be  persons. 

How  the  human  individual  forms  these  concepts  and  finds 
them  verified  in  his  own  "  self,"  how  he  gradually  comes  into 
conscious  possession  of  the  knowledge  of  his  own  individual 
being  as  an  Ego,  self,  or  person,  are  problems  for  Psychol- 
ogy.1 It  will  be  sufficient  here  to  point  out  that  there  are 
grounds  for  distinguishing  between  the  individual's  implicit  sub- 
jective awareness  of  his  subsistence  or  "selfhood  " — an  awareness 
which  accompanies  all  his  conscious  mental  functions,  and  which 
becomes  more  explicit  and  definite  as  the  power  of  introspection 
and  reflex  consciousness  develops — and  the  "  abstract  quasi-objec- 
tive notion  of  his  own  personality  habitually  possessed  by  every 
human  being".2 

The  individual  human  being  immediately  apprehends  his  own 
existence,  and  his  abiding  unity  or  sameness  throughout  inces- 
santly changing  states,  in  the  temporal  series  of  his  conscious 
activities;  but  his  knowledge  of  the  nature  of  his  own  being  can 
be  the  result  only  of  a  long  and  carefully  conducted  analysis  of 
his  own  activities,  and  of  inferences  based  on  the  character  of 
these  activities.  The  former  or  implicit  knowledge  of  the  self 
in  the  concrete  is  direct  and  intuitive.  The  individual  Ego 
apprehends  itself  in  its  states.  This  knowledge  comes  mainly 
from  within,  and  is  subject  to  gradual  development.  Father 
Maher  thus  describes  how  the  child  comes  gradually  into  pos- 
session of  it : — 

As  thoughts  of  pleasures  and  pains  repeated  in  the  past  and  expected  in 
the  future  grow  more  distinct,  the  dissimilarity  between  these  and  the  per- 
manent abiding  self  comes  to  be  more  fully  realized.  Passing  emotions  of 
fear,  anger,  vanity,  pride,  or  sympathy,  accentuate  the  difference.  But 

1C/.  MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  xvii.  2  ibid.,  p.  365. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  275 

most  probably  it  is  the  dawning  sense  of  power  to  resist  and  overcome  rising 
impulse,  and  the  dim  nascent  consciousness  of  responsibility,  which  lead  up 
to  the  final  revelation,  until  at  last,  in  some  reflective  act  of  memory  or 
choice,  or  in  some  vague  effort  to  understand  the  oft-heard  "  I,"  the  great 
truth  is  manifested  to  him  :  the  child  enters,  as  it  were,  into  possession  of  his 
personality,  and  knows  himself  as  a  Self-conscious  Being.  The  Ego  does 
not  create  but  discovers  itself.  In  Jouffroy's  felicitous  phrase,  it  "breaks  its 
shell,"  and  finds  that  it  is  a  Personal  Agent  with  an  existence  and  individuality 
of  its  own^  standing  henceforward  alone  in  opposition  to  the  universe.1 

After  this  stage  is  reached,  the  human  individual  easily  dis- 
tinguishes between  the  "  self"  as  the  cause  or  subject  of  the  states, 
and  the  states  as  modifications  of  the  self.  This  distinction  is 
implicit  in  the  concomitant  awareness  of  elf  which  accompanies 
all  exercise  of  direct  cognitive  consciousness.  It  is  explicit  in 
all  deliberate  acts  of  reflex,  introspective  self-consciousness.  The 
data  from  which  we  form  the  abstract  concepts  of  substance, 
nature,  individual,  person,  self,  etc.,  and  from  which  we  arrive 
by  reasoning  at  a  philosophical  knowledge  of  the  nature  and 
personality  of  the  human  individual,  are  furnished  mainly  by 
introspection ;  but  also  in  part  by  external  observation  of  the 
universe  around  us. 

Concomitantly,  however,  with  the  process  by  which  we  be- 
come implicitly  but  immediately  aware  of  the  Ego  or  self  as  an 
abiding  self-identical  person  in  and  through  our  own  mental 
activity,  we  gradually  form  a  quasi-objective  and  historical  view 
of  our  own  personality  as  one  of  a  number  of » similar  person- 
alities around  us  in  the  universe.  This  view,  says  Father  Maher, 

gathers  into  itself  the  history  of  my  past  life — the  actions  of  my  child- 
hood, boyhood,  youth,  and  later  years.  Interwoven  with  them  all  is  the 
image  of  my  bodily  organism,  and  clustering  around  are  a  fringe  of  recol- 
lections of  my  dispositions,  habits,  and  character,  of  my  hopes  and  regrets, 
of  my  resolutions  and  failures,  along  with  a  dim  consciousness  of  my  position 
in  the  minds  of  other  selves. 

Under  the  form  of  a  representation  of  this  composite  art,  bound  together 
by  the  thread  of  memory,  each  of  us  ordinarily  conceives  his  complete 
abiding  personality.  This  idea  is  necessarily  undergoing  constant  modifica- 
tion ;  and  it  is  in  comparing  the  present  form  of  the  representation  with  the 
past,  whilst  adverting  to  considerable  alterations  in  my  character,  bodily 
appearance,  and  the  like,  that  I  sometimes  say  :  "  I  am  completely  changed," 
"  I  am  quite  another  person,"  though  I  am,  of  course,  convinced  that  it  is  the 
same  "  I  "  who  am  changed  in  accidental  qualities.  It  is  because  this  complex 
notion  of  my  personality  is  an  abstraction  from  my  remembered  experiences 

1  C/.  MAKER,  Psychology,  p.  363. 
18* 


276  ONTOLOGY 

that  a  perversion  of  imagination  and  a  rupture  of  memory  can  sometimes 
induce  the  so-called  "  illusions  or  alterations  of  personality  ".* 

When  we  remember  that  this  objective  conception  of  the  self 
is  so  dependent  on  the  function  of  memory,  and  that  the  normal 
exercise  of  this  faculty  is  in  turn  so  dependent  on  the  normal 
functioning  of  the  brain  and  the  nervous  system,2  we  can  hazard 
an  intelligible  explanation  of  the  abnormal  facts  recorded  by  most 
modern  psychologists  concerning  hypnotism,  somnambulism  and 
"  double  "  or  "  multiple  "  consciousness.3  Father  Maher,  ascrib- 
ing these  phenomena  partly  to  dislocations  of  memory,  partly  to 
unusual  groupings  of  mental  states  according  to  the  laws  of 
mental  association — groupings  that  arise  from  peculiar  physio- 
logical connexions  between  the  various  neural  functionings  of 
the  brain  centres, — and  partly  to  semi-conscious  or  reflex  nerve 
processes,  emphasizes  an  important  fact  that  is  sometimes  lost 
sight  of:  the  fact  that  some  section  at  least  of  the  individual's 
conscious  mental  life  is  common  to,  and  present  throughout,  the 
two  or  more  "  states  "  or  "  conditions  "  between  which  any  such 
abnormal  individual  is  found  to  alternate.  This  consideration  is 
itself  sufficient  to  disprove  the  theory — to  which  we  shall  pre- 
sently refer — that  there  is  or  may  be  in  the  individual  human 
being  a  double,  or  even  a  multiple  "  human  personality  ". 

75.  FALSE  THEORIES  OF  PERSONALITY. — It  is  plain  that  con- 
scious mental  activity  cannot  constitute  human  personality,  or  sub- 
conscious mental  activity  either,  for  all  activity  is  of  the  accidental 
mode  of  being,  is  an  accident ',  whereas  a  person  must  be  a  sub- 
stance. Of  course  it  is  the  self-conscious  cognitive  activity  of  the 
human  individual  that  reveals  to  the  latter  his  own  self  as  a 
person :  it  is  the  exercise  of  reflex  consciousness  combined  with 
memory  that  gives  us  the  feeling  of  personal  identity  with  our- 
selves throughout  the  changing  events  of  our  mental  and  bodily 
life.  Furthermore,  this  self-consciousness  has  its  root  in  the 
rational  nature  of  the  human  individual ;  and  rationality  of 
nature  is  the  differentiating  principle  which  makes  the  subsisting 
individual  a  "  person  "  as  distinct  from  a  (subsisting)  "  thing  ".  But 
then,  it  is  not  the  feeling  of  personal  identity  that  constitutes  the 
person.  Actual  consciousness  is  neither  the  essence,  nor  the 

1C/.  MAKER,  Psychology,  p.  365  (italics  in  last  sentence  ours). 
2  C/.  RICKABY,  First  Principles,  p.  370. 

8  C/.  MAKER,  ibid.,  pp.  487-92 ;  MERCIER,  Psychologic,  ii.,  pp.  197-224  (6th 
edit.) ;  Ontologie,  §  153  (p.  304). 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  277 

source,  nor  even  the  index  of  personality;  for  it  is  only  an 
activity,  and  an  activity  which  reveals  immediately  not  the  person 
as  such,  but  the  nature  as  rational ; l  nor  does  the  rational 
(substantial)  principle  of  a  composite  nature  constitute  the  latter 
a  person ;  but  only  the  subsistence  of  the  complete  (composite) 
individual  nature  itself. 

These  considerations  are  sufficiently  obvious  ;  they  presuppose, 
however,  the  truth  of  the  traditional  doctrine  already  explained 
in  regard  to  the  existence,  nature  and  cognoscibility  of  substance. 
Philosophers  who  have  misunderstood  and  rejected  and  lost 
this  traditional  doctrine  of  substance  have  propounded  many 
varieties  of  unsatisfactory  and  inconsistent  theories  in  regard  to 
what  constitutes  "  person  "  and  "  personality  ".  The  main  feature 
of  all  such  theories  is  their  identification  of  personality  with  the 
habitual  consciousness  of  self,  or  habitual  feeling  of  personal 
identity :  a  feeling  which,  however,  must  be  admitted  to  include 
memory  in  some  form,  while  the  function  of  memory  in  any  shape 
or  form  cannot  be  satisfactorily  explained  on  any  theory  of  the 
human  Ego  which  denies  that  there  is  a  human  substance  per- 
sisting permanently  as  a  unifying  principle  of  successive  mental 
states  (63-4). 

So  far  as  English  philosophy  is  concerned  such  theories 
appear  to  have  had  their  origin  in  Locke's  teaching  on  person 
and  personal  identity.  Discussing  the  notions  of  identity  and 
diversity,2  he  distinguishes  between  the  identity  of  an  individual 
substance  with  itself  in  its  duration  throughout  time,  and  what 
he  terms  personal  identity ;  while  by  identity  in  general  he 
means  not  abstract  identity  but  the  concrete  permanence  of  a 
thing  throughout  time  (34).  On  this  we  have  to  call  attention 
to  the  fact  that  just  as  duration  is  not  essential  to  the  constitution 
of  a  substance,  so  neither  is  it  essential  to  the  constitution  of  a 
complete  subsisting  individual  substance  or  person  (64) ;  though 
it  is,  of  course,  an  essential  condition  for  all  human  apprehension 
whether  of  substance  or  of  person.  Locke  was  wrong,  therefore, 
in  confounding  what  reveals  to  us  the  abiding  permanence, 
identity  or  sameness  of  a  subsisting  thing  or  person  (whether  the 
"  self"  or  any  other  subsisting  thing  or  person)  throughout 

1  There  are  cogent  theological  reasons  also  against  the  view  that  consciousness 
constitutes  personality.  For  instance,  the  human  nature  of  our  Divine  Lord  has  its 
own  proper  consciousness,  which,  nevertheless,  does  not  constitute  this  nature  a 
person. 

8  E$say  Concerning  Human  Under  standing ,  bk.  ii.,  ch,  xxvii. 


278  ONTOLOGY 

its  duration  in  time,  with  what  constitutes  the  subsisting  thing 
or  person. 

Furthermore,  his  distinction  between  substantial  identity,  i.e. 
the  sameness  of  an  individual  substance  with  itself  throughout 
time,  and  personal  identity  or  sameness,  was  also  an  error.  For 
as  long  as  there  is  substantial  unity,  continuity,  or  indentity  of 
the  subsisting  individual  substance,  so  long  is  there  unity,  con- 
tinuity, or  identity  of  its  subsistence,  or  of  its  personality  if  it  be 
a  rational  substance.  The  subsistence  of  a  complete  individual 
inorganic  substance  is  changed  as  soon  as  the  individual  under- 
goes substantial  change :  we  have  them  no  longer  the  same 
subsisting  individual  being.  So,  too,  the  subsistence  of  the 
organic  individual  is  changed  as  soon  as  the  latter  undergoes 
substantial  change  by  the  dissolution  of  life,  by  the  separ- 
ation of  its  formative  and  vital  substantial  principle  from  its 
material  substantial  principle :  after  such  dissolution  we  have  no 
longer  the  same  subsisting  plant  or  animal.  And,  finally,  the 
subsistence  of  an  individual  man  is  changed,  or  interrupted,  or 
ceases  by  death,  which  separates  his  soul,  his  vital  principle,  from 
his  body.  We  say,  moreover,  that  in  the  latter  case  the  human 
person  ceases  to  exist  when  the  identity  or  permanence  of  his 
subsisting  substance  or  nature  terminates  at  death ;  for  personal 
identity  we  hold  to  be  the  identity  of  the  complete  subsisting  sub- 
stance or  nature  with  itself.  But  Locke,  who  practically  agrees 
with  what  we  have  said  regarding  the  abiding  identity  of  the  sub- 
sisting individual  being  with  itself — whether  this  individual  be 
an  inorganic  individual,  a  plant,  a  brute  beast,  or  a  man  1 — dis- 
tinguishes at  this  point  between  identity  of  the  subsisting  indi- 
vidual substance  and  personal  identity. 

1  "  That  being  then  one  plant  which  has  such  an  organization  of  parts  in  one 
coherent  body  partaking  of  one  common  life,  it  continues  to  be  the  same  plant  as  long 
as  it  continues  to  partake  of  the  same  life,  though  that  life  be  communicated  to 
different  particles  of  matter  vitally  united  to  the  living  plant,  in  a  like  continued 
organization  conformable  to  that  sort  of  plants.  .  .  . 

"  The  case  is  not  so  much  different  in  brutes,  but  that  anyone  may  hence  see 
what  makes  an  animal  and  continues  it  the  same.  .  .  . 

"  This  also  shows  wherein  the  identity  of  the  same  man  consists  :  viz.  in  nothing 
but  a  participation  of  the  same  continued  life,  by  constantly  fleeting  particles  of 
matter,  in  succession  vitally  united  to  the  same  organized  body.  .  .  .  For  if  the 
identity  of  soul  alone  makes  the  same  man,  and  there  be  nothing  in  the  nature  of 
matter  why  the  same  individual  spirit  may  be  united  [i.e.  successively]  to  different 
bodies,  it  will  be  possible  that .  .  .  men  living  in  distant  ages,  and  of  different  tempers, 
may  have  been  the  same  man.  .  .  ." — Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding, 
bk.  ii.  ch.  xxvii.  §  4-6.  Yet  though  "  identity  of  soul "  does  not  make  "  the  same 
man,"  Locke  goes  on  immediately  to  assert  that  identity  of  consciousness,  which  is 
but  a  function  of  the  soul,  makes  the  same  person. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  279 

Of  identity  in  general  he  says  that  "  to  conceive  and  judge  of 
it  aright,  we  must  consider  what  idea  the  word  it  is  applied  to 
stands  for ;  it  being  one  thing  to  be  the  same  substance,  another 
the  same  man,  and  a  third  the  same  person,  if  person,  man,  and 
substance,  are  three  names  standing  for  three  different  ideas  "-1 
And,  struggling  to  dissociate  "person  "  from  "  substance,"  he  con- 
tinues thus : — 

^ 

To  find  wherein  personal  identity  consists,  we  must  consider  what  person 
stands  for  ;  which,  I  think,  is  a  thinking,  intelligent  being,  that  has  reason  and 
reflection,  and  can  consider  itself  as  itself,  the  same  thinking  thing  in  different 
times  and  places  ;  which  it  does  only  by  that  consciousness  which  is  insepar- 
able from  thinking,  and,  as  it  seems  to  me,  essential  to  it.  When  we  see,  hear, 
smell,  taste,  feel,  meditate,  or  will  any  thing,  we  know  that  we  do  so.  Thus 
it  is  always  as  to  our  present  sensations  and  perceptions,  and  by  this  every-one 
is  to  himself  what  he  calls  self ;  it  not  being  considered  in  this  case  whether 
the  same  self  be  continued  in  the  same  or  divers  substances.  For  since  con- 
sciousness always  accompanies  thinking,  and  it  is  that  which  makes  every  one 
to  be  what  he  calls  self,  and  thereby  distinguishes  himself  from  all  other 
thinking  things  j  in  this  alone  consists  personal  identity,  i.e.  the  sameness  of  a 
rational  being :  and  as  far  as  this  consciousness  can  be  extended  backwards 
to  any  past  action  or  thought,  so  far  reaches  the  identity  of  that  person  ;  it  is 
the  same  self  now  it  was  then  ;  and  it  is  by  the  same  self  with  this  present  one 
that  now  reflects  on  it,  that  that  action  was  done.2 

The  definition  of  person  in  this  passage  as  "a  thinking, 
intelligent  being,"  etc.,  is  not  far  removed  from  our  own  defini- 
tion ;  but  surely  conscious  thought  is  not  "  that  which  makes 
every  one  to  be  what  he  calls  self,"  seeing  that  conscious  thought 
is  only  an  activity  or  function  of  the  "  rational  being  ".  It  is 
conscious  thought,  of  course,  including  memory,  that  reveals  the 
"  rational  being  "  to  himself  as  a  self,  and  as  the  same  or  identical 
self  throughout  time ;  but  unless  the  "  rational  being,"  or  the 
"  thinking,  intelligent  being,  that  has  reason  and  reflection,"  etc. 
—which  is  Locke's  own  definition  of  "person" — were  there  all 
the  time  identical  with  itself,  exercising  those  distinct  and  succes- 
sive acts  of  consciousness  and  memory,  and  unifying  them,  how 
could  these  acts  even  reveal  the  "  person "  or  his  ' '  personal 
identity  "  to  himself,  not  to  speak  of  their  constituting  personal- 
ity or  personal  identity?  It  is  perfectly  plain  that  these  acts 

1  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  bk.  ii.,  ch.  xxvii.,  §7.  Names  do  not 
stand  for  ideas  or  concepts  but  for  conceived  realities  ;  and  the  question  here  is  :  What 
is  the  conceived  reality  (in  the  existing  human  individual)  for  which  the  term  "  per- 
son "  stands  ? 


280  ONTOLOGY 

presuppose  the  "person,"  the  "thinking,  intelligent  being,"  or,  as 
we  have  expressed  it,  the  "  subsisting,  rational,  individual  nature  " 
already  constituted;  and  it  is  equally  plain  that  the  "personal 
identity  "  which  they  reveal  is  constituted  fy,  and  consists  simply 
in,  the  duration  or  continued  existence  of  this  same  subsisting 
individual  rational  nature;  nor  could  these  acts  reveal  any 
identity,  personal  or  otherwise,  unless  they  were  the  acts  of  one 
and  the  same  actually  subsisting,  existing  and  persisting  sub- 
stance. 

Yet  Locke  thinks  he  can  divorce  personal  identity  from 
identity  of  substance,  and  account  for  the  former  independently 
of  the  latter.  In  face  of  the  obvious  difficulty  that  actual  con- 
sciousness is  not  continuous  but  intermittent,  he  tries  to  main- 
tain that  the  consciousness  which  links  together  present  states 
with  remembered  states  is  sufficient  to  constitute  personal  identity 
even  although  there  may  have  intervened  between  the  present  and 
the  past  states  a  complete  change  of  substance,  so  that  it  is 
really  a  different  substance  which  experiences  the  present  states 
from  that  which  experienced  the  past  states.  The  question 

Whether  we  are  the  same  thinking  thing,  i.e.  the  same  substance  or  no  .  .  . 
concerns  not  personal  identity  at  all :  the  question  being,  what  makes  the 
same  person,  and  not  whether  it  be  the  same  identical  substance,  which 
always  thinks  in  the  same  person  :  different  substances,  by  the  same  con- 
sciousness (where  they  do  partake  in  it),  being  united  into  one  person,  as 
well  as  different  bodies  by  the  same  life  are  united  into  one  animal,  whose 
identity  is  preserved,  in  that  change  of  substances,  by  the  unity  of  one  con- 
tinued life  .  .  .  [for]  animal  identity  is  preserved  in  identity  of  life,  and  not 
of  substance.1 

Here  the  contention  is  that  we  can  have  "  the  same  person  " 
and  yet  not  necessarily  "  the  same  identical  substance,"  because 
consciousness  may  give  a  personal  unity  to  distinct  and  successive 
substances  in  the  individual  man  just  as  animal  life  gives  an 
analogous  unity  to  distinct  and  successive  substances  in  the 
individual  animal.  This  is  very  superficial ;  for  it  only  substi- 
tutes for  the  problem  of  human  personality  the  similiar 'problem 
of  explaining  the  unity  and  sameness  of  subsistence  in  the 
individual  living  thing :  a  problem  which  involves  the  fact  of 
memory  in  animals.  For  scholastic  philosophers  unity  of  life  in 
the  living  thing,  involving  the  fact  of  memory  in  animals,  is  ex- 
plained by  the  perfectly  intelligible  and  will-grounded  teaching 

1  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  bk.  ii.,  ch.  xxvii.,  §§  13,  14. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  281 

that  there  is  in  each  individual  living  thing  a  formative  and  vital 
principle  which  is  substantial,  a  forma  substantiate,  which  unites, 
in  the  abiding  self-identical  unity  of  a  complete  individual  composite 
substance,  the  material  principle  of  the  corporeal  substances 
which  thus  go,  in  the  incessant  process  of  substantial  change 
known  as  metabolism,  to  form  partially,  and  to  support  the 
substantial  continuity  of,  the  living  individual.  While  the  latter 
is  thus  in  constant  process  of  material,  or  partial,  substantial 
change,  it  remains,  as  long  as  it  lives,  the  same  complete  indi- 
vidual substance,  and  this  in  virtue  of  the  abiding  substantial 
formative  and  vital  principle  which  actuates  and  animates  it. 
The  abiding  permanence  or  self-identity  of  the  subsisting  indivi- 
dual substance  which  feels  or  thinks,  and  remembers,  is  an 
intelligible,  and  indeed  the  only  intelligible,  ground  and  explana- 
tion of  memory,  and  of  our  consciousness  of  personal  identity. 

But  if  we  leave  out  of  account  this  abiding  continuity  and 
self-identity  of  the  subsisting  individual  substance  or  nature, 
which  is  the  subject,  cause  and  agent  of  these  acts  of  memory 
and  consciousness,  how  can  these  latter,  in  and  by  themselves, 
possibly  form,  or  even  indeed  reveal  to  us,  our  personal  identity? 
Locke  felt  this  difficulty  ;  and  he  tried  in  vain  to  meet  it :  in 
vain,  for  it  is  insuperable.  He  merely  suggests  that  "  the  same 
consciousness  .  .  .  can  be  transferred  from  one  thinking  sub- 
stance to  another,"  in  which  case  "it  will  be  possible  that  two 
thinking  substances  may  make  [successively]  one  person".1 
This  is  practically  his  last  word  on  the  question, — and  it  is  worthy 
of  note,  for  it  virtually  substantializes  consciousness.  It  makes 
consciousness,  which  is  really  only  an  act  or  a  series  of  acts,  a 
something  substantial  and  subsisting.  We  have  seen  already  how 
modern  phenomenists,  once  they  reject  the  notion  of  substance 
as  invalid  or  superfluous,  must  by  that  very  fact  equivalently 
substantialize  accidents  (6 1 ) ;  for  substance,  being  a  necessary 
category  of  human  thought  as  exercised  on  reality,  cannot  really 
be  dispensed  with.  And  we  see  in  the  present  context  an 
illustration  of  this  fact.  The  abiding  self-identity  of  the  human 
person  cannot  be  explained  otherwise  than  by  the  abiding  self- 
identical  subsistence  of  the  individual  human  substance. 

If  personal  identity  were  constituted  and  determined  by  con- 
sciousness, by  the  series  of  conscious  states  connected  and 
unified  by  memory,  then  it  would  appear  that  the  human  being 

1  Essay  Concerning  Human  Understanding,  bk.  ii.,  ch.  xxvii.,  §  13. 


282  ONTOLOGY 

in  infancy,  in  sleep,  in  unconsciousness,  or  in  a  state  of  insanity, 
is  not  a  human  person !  Philosophers  who  have  not  the  hardi- 
hood to  deny  human  personality  to  the  undividual  of  the  human 
species  in  these  states,  and  who  on  the  other  hand  will  not 
recognize  the  possession  of  a  rational  nature  or  substance  by  the 
subsisting  individual  as  the  ground  of  the  latter's  personality  and 
personal  identity,  have  recourse  to  the  hypothesis  of  a  sub-con- 
scious^ or  "  sub-liminal "  consciousness  in  the  individual,  as  a 
substitute.  If  by  this  they  merely  meant  an  abiding  substantial 
rational  principle  of  all  mental  activities,  even  of  those  which 
may  be  semi-conscious  or  sub-conscious,  they  would  be  merely 
calling  by  another  name  what  we  call  the  rational  nature  of  man. 
And  the  fact  that  they  refer  to  this  principle  as  the  sub-conscious 
"self"  or  "Ego"  shows  how  insistent  is  the  rational  need  for 
rooting  personality  and  personal  identity  in  something  which  is 
a  substance.  But  they  do  not  and  will  not  conceive  it  as  a  sub- 
stance ;  whereas  if  it  is  not  this,  if  it  is  only  a  "  process,"  or  a 
"  function,"  or  a  "  series  "  or  "  stream  "  of  processes  or  functions, 
it  can  no  more  constitute  or  explain,  or  even  reveal,  personal 
identity,  than  a  series  or  stream  of  conscious  states  can.1 

Unable  as  he  was  to  explain  how  the  same  consciousness 
could  persist  throughout  a  succession  of  really  and  adequately 
distinct  substances  (except  by  virtually  substantializing  conscious- 
ness), Locke  nevertheless  persisted  in  holding  that  consciousness 
and  consciousness  alone  (including  memory,  which,  however,  is 
inexplicable  on  any  other  theory  than  that  of  a  subsisting  and 
persisting  substance  or  nature  which  remembers),  constitutes 
personality  and  personal  identity.  We  have  dwelt  upon  his 
teaching  mainly  because  all  modern  phenomenists  try  to  explain 
personality  on  the  same  principles — i.e.  independently  of  the  doc- 
trine of  substance. 

As  a  corollary  from  his  doctrine  he  inferred  that  if  a  man  completely  and 
irrevocably  loses  consciousness  [or  rather  memory]  of  his  past  life,  though  he 
remains  the  same  "man"  he  is  no  longer  the  same  "person":  "if  it  be 
possible  for  the  same  man  to  have  distinct  incommunicable  consciousness  at 
different  times,  it  is  past  doubt  the  same  man  would  at  different  times  make 
different  persons  "  ; 2  and  he  goes  on  in  this  sense  to  give  a  literal  interpreta- 
tion to  the  modes  of  speech  we  have  referred  to  above.3  He  likewise 

1  For  a  searching  criticism  of  such  theories  of  the  Ego  or  human  person,  cf. 
MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  xxii. 
*ibid.,  §  19. 
«  p.  276. 


NATURE  AND  PERSON  283 

admitted  that  two  or  more  "  persons,"  i.e.  consciousnesses,  can  be  linked  with 
the  same  individual  human  being,  or  the  same  individual  human  soul,  alter- 
nately appearing  and  disappearing,  giving  place  successively  to  one  another. 
When  any  one  of  these  "  personalities  "  or  consciousnesses  ceases  to  be  actual, 
it  must  in  Locke's  view  cease  to  be  in  any  sense  real :  so  that  there  could 
not  be  two  or  more  personalities  at  the  same  time  in  the  same  individual 
human  being.  Modern  psychologists,  however,  of  the  phenomenist  school, 
convinced  that  sub-conscious  mental  activities  are  not  only  possible,  but  that 
the  fact  of  such  activities  is  well  established  by  a  variety  of  experiences,  have 
extended  Locke's  conception  of  personality  (as  actual  consciousness)  to 
embrace  groups  of  mental  activities  which  may  emerge  only  intermittently 
"  above  the  threshold  of  consciousness  ".  Hence  they  explain  the  abnormal 
cases  of  double  or  multiple  consciousness  already  referred  to,  as  being 
manifestations  of  really  distinct  "  personalities  "  in  one  and  the  same  human 
individual.  In  normal  human  beings  there  is,  they  say,  only  one  normally 
"  conscious  personality ".  The  sub-conscious  mental  activities  of  such  an 
individual  they  bulk  together  as  forming  this  individual's  "  sub-liminal  "  or 
"  sub-conscious  "  Ego  or  "  self"  :  presumably  a  distinct  personality  from  the 
conscious  one.  In  the  abnormal  cases  of  "  double-consciousness  "  the  sub- 
liminal self  struggles  for  mastery  over  the  conscious  self  and  is  for  a  time 
successful :  the  two  personalities  thus  for  a  time  changing  places  as  it  were. 
In  the  rarer  or  more  abnormal  cases  of  treble  or  multiple  consciousness,  there 
are  presumably  three  or  more  "  personalities  "  engaged  in  the  struggle,  each 
coming  to  the  surface  in  turn  and  submerging  the  others. 

It  is  not  the  fancifulness  of  this  theory  that  one  might  object  to  so  much 
as  its  utter  inadequacy  to  explain  the  facts,  nay,  its  utter  unintelligibility  on 
the  principles  of  those  who  propound  it.  For  we  must  not  lose  sight  of  the 
fact  that  it  is  propounded  by  philosophers  who  purport  to  explain  mental 
life  and  human  personality  without  recourse  to  a  substantial  soul,  to  any 
substantial  basis  of  mental  life,  or  indeed  to  the  concept  of  substance  at  all  : 
by  philosophers  who  will  talk  of  a  mental  process  without  admitting  mind  or 
soul  as  a  substance  or  subject  of  that  process,  of  a  "  series  "  or  "  stream  "  of 
mental  functions  or  activities  without  allowing  any  agent  that  would  exercise 
those  functions,  or  any  substantial  abiding  principle  that  would  unify  the 
series  or  stream  and  know  it  as  such ;  philosophers  who  regard  the  Ego, 
"  self,"  or  "  person,"  as  nothing  other  than  the  group  or  series  or  stream  of 
mental  states,  and  not  as  anything  of  which  these  are  the  states  ;  and,  finally, 
who  speak  of  these  groups  of  functions  or  activities  as  "  personalities  " — 
which  they  describe  as  "struggling"  with  one  another — apparently  oblivious 
of  the  fact  that  by  using  such  language  they  are  in  their  thought  at  least 
transforming  these  activities  into  agents,  these  states  into  subjects  of  states^ 
in  a  word,  these  accidents  into  substances ;  or  else  they  are  making  their 
language  and  their  thought  alike  unintelligible.1 

1  C/.  MAKER'S  criticism  of  Professor  James'  theory  on  double  personality  (op. 
cit.,  ch.  xxii.,  pp.  491-2) :  "  Professor  James  devotes  much  space  to  these '  mutations  ' 
of  the  Ego,  yet  overlooks  the  fact  that  they  are  peculiarly  fatal,  not  to  his  adversaries, 
but  to  his  own  theory  that  '  the  present  thought  is  the  only  thinker,'  and  that  seem- 
ing identity  is  sufficiently  preserved  by  each  thought '  appropriating  '  and*  inheriting  ' 
the  contents  of  its  predecessor,  The  difficulties  presented  to  this  process  of  inherit- 


284  ONTOLOGY 

Of  course  those  numerous  modern  philosophers  who,  like  James,  try  to 
"  find  a  place  for  all  the  experiential  facts  unencumbered  by  any  hypothesis 
[like  that  of  an  individual  substantial  soul,  presumably]  save  that  of  passing 
states  of  mind  "  [ibid.,  p.  480],  do  not  really  leave  these  "  states  "  suspended 
in  mid-air  as  it  were.  The  imperative  need  for  admitting  the  reality  of  sub- 
stance always  ultimately  asserts  itself:  as  when  James  recognizes  the  neces- 
sity of  admitting  something  "more  than  the  bare  fact  of  co-existence  of  a 
passing  thought  with  a  passing  brain-state"  {Principles  of  Psychology,  i., 
p.  346 — apud  MAKER,  iHd.t  p.  483].  Only  his  speculation  as  to  what  con- 
stitutes this  " something  'more'  which  lies  behind  our  mental  states"  [ibid., 
p.  485]  is  not  particularly  convincing  :  "  For  my  own  part,"  he  says,  "  I  con- 
fess that  the  moment  I  become  metaphysical  and  try  to  define  the  more,  I 
find  the  notion  of  some  sort  of  an  anima  mundi  thinking  in  all  of  us  to  be  a 
more  promising  hypothesis,  in  spite  of  all  its  difficulties,  than  that  of  a  lot  of 
absolutely  individual  souls  "  [ibid.,  p.  346 — apud  MAKER,  ibid.~\.  This  re- 
statement of  the  medieval  pantheistic  theory  known  as  Averroism,  Mono- 
psychism,  or  the  theory  of  the  intellectus  separatus  [cf.  DE  WULF,  History 
of  Medieval  Philosophy,  pp.  381  sqq."\,  is  a  somewhat  disappointing  contribu- 
tion to  Metaphysics  from  the  most  brilliant  of  our  modern  psychologists. 
The  "difficulties"  of  this  "more  promising  hypothesis"  had  discredited  it  a 
rather  long  time  before  Professor  James  resurrected  it  [cf.  criticisms — apud 
MAKER,  ibid.]. 

ance  by  such  facts  as  sleep  and  swooning  have  been  already  dwelt  upon  [cf.  ibid., 
p.  480  (c)] ;  but  here  they  are  if  possible  increased.  The  last  conscious  thought  of, 
say,  Felida  2  has  to  transmit  its  gathered  experience  not  to  its  proximate  conscious 
successor,  which  is  Felida  I,  but  across  seven  months  of  vacuum  until  on  the  ex- 
tinction of  Felida  i  the  next  conscious  thought  which  constitutes  Felida  2  is  born 
into  existence.  If  the  single  personality  is  hard  for  Mr.  James  to  explain,  '  double- 
personality  '  at  least  doubles  his  difficulties." 


CHAPTER  X. 
SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING :  QUALITY. 

76.  ONTOLOGY  AND  THE  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING.— 
Under  the  ultimate  category  or  genus  supremum  of  Substance  ex- 
perience reveals  to  us  two  broadly  distinct  sub-classes :  corporeal 
substances,  "bodies"  or  " material"  things,  and  spiritual  sub- 
stances or  "  spirits  ".  Of  these  latter  we  have  direct  experience 
only  of  one  class,  viz.  embodied  spirits  or  human  souls.  The  in- 
vestigation of  the  nature  of  these  belongs  to  Psychology ',  and  from 
the  data  of  that  science  we  may  infer,  by  the  light  of  reason,  the 
possibility  of  another  class  of  spirits,  viz.  pure  spirits,  beings  of  whose 
actual  existence  we  know  from  Divine  Revelation.  The  existence 
of  a  Supreme  Being,  Whom  we  must  conceive  analogically  as  sub- 
stance and  spirit,  is  demonstrated  by  the  light  of  reason  in 
Natural  Theology.  The  investigation  of  the  nature  of  corporeal 
substances  belongs  properly  to  Cosmology.  Hence  in  the  present 
treatise  we  have  no  further  direct  concern  with  the  substance-mode 
of  reality ; *  but  only  with  its  accident-modes,  and  not  with  all  of 
these. 

Not  with  all  of  them  ;  for  those  which  belong  properly  to 
spiritual  substances,  or  properly  to  corporeal  substances,  call  for 
special  treatment  in  Psychology  and  Cosmology  respectively.  In 
the  main,  only  such  species  of  accidents  as  are  common  to  matter 
and  spirit  alike,  will  form  the  subject  of  the  remaining  portion  of 
the  present  volume.  Only  the  broader  aspects  of  such  categories 
as  Quality,  Quantity  and  Causality — aspects  which  have  a  more 
direct  bearing  on  the  Theory  of  Being  and  the  Theory  of 
Knowledge  in  general, — call  for  treatment  in  General  Metaphy- 
sics. A  more  detailed  treatment  must  be  sought  in  other  depart- 
ments of  Philosophy. 

1  Cf.  infra,  §  82. 
285 


286  ONTOLOGY 

77.  NATURE  OF  THE  ACCIDENT  CALLED  QUALITY.— In  the 
widest  sense  of  the  term,  Quality  is  synonymous  with  logical  at- 
tribute. In  this  sense  whatever  can  be  predicated  of  a  subject, 
whatever  logically  determines  a  subject  in  any  way  for  our  thought 
is  a  quality  or  "  attribute  "  of  that  subject.  In  a  sense  almost 
equally  wide  the  term  is  used  to  designate  any  real  determina- 
tion, whether  substantial  or  accidental,  of  a  subject.  In  this  sense 
the  differential  element,  or  differentia  specifica,  determines  the 
generic  element,  or  genus,  of  a  substance :  it  tells  us  what  kind 
or  species  the  substance  is  :  e.g.  what  kind  of  animal  a  man  is,  viz. 
rational ;  what  kind  of  living  thing  an  animal  is,  viz.  sentient ; 
what  kind  of  body  or  corporeal  thing  a  plant  is,  viz.  living. 
And  hence  scholastics  have  said  of  the  predicable  "differentia 
specifica  "  that  it  is  predicated  adjectivally,  or  as  a  quality,  to  tell 
us  in  what  the  thing  consists,  or  what  is  its  nature :  differentia 
specifica  praedicatur  in  quale  quid:  it  gives  us  the  determining 
principle  of  the  specific  nature.  Or,  again,  quality  is  used 
synonymously  with  any  accidental  determination  of  a  sub- 
stance. In  this  sense  magnitude,  location,  action,  etc.,  though 
they  determine  a  subject  in  different  accidental  ways,  nevertheless 
are  all  indiscriminately  said  to  "  qualify  "  it  in  the  sense  of  deter- 
mining it  somehow  or  other,  and  are  therefore  called  "  qualities  " 
in  the  wide  sense  of  "  accidents  ".  Hence,  again,  the  scholastics 
have  said  that  inasmuch  as  all  accidents  determine  or  qualify  their 
subjects,  they  are  predicated  of  these  qualitatively,  and  may  be 
called  in  a  wide  sense  "qualifications"  or  "qualities":  omnia 
genera  accidentium  qualificant  substantiam  et  praedicantur  in 
quale. 

It  is  in  this  wide  sense  that  we  use  the  term  when  we  say 
that  the  (specific)  nature  (or  "  kind  ")  of  a  thing  is  revealed  by  its 
"  qualities  "  ;  for  the  nature  of  a  thing  is  revealed  by  all  its  accidents. 
And  when  we  infer  the  nature  of  a  thing  from  its  activities,  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  maxim  Qualis  est  operatio  talis  est  natura,  we 
must  take  the  term  "operatio"  or  "  activity"  to  include  the  oper- 
ation of  the  thing  on  our  cognitive  faculties,  the  states  of  cognitive 
consciousness  thus  aroused  in  us,  and  all  the  other  accidents  thus 
revealed  to  us  in  the  thing  by  its  "knowledge-eliciting"  action 
on  our  minds. 

But  the  term  Quality  has  been  traditionally  restricted,  after 
Aristotle,  to  designate  properly  one  particular  category  of  acci- 
dents distinct  from  the  others  and  from  substance. 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING :  QUALITY      287 

A  definition  proper  of  any  genus  supremum  is  of  course  out  of 
the  question.  But  it  is  not  easy  to  give  even  a  description  which 
will  convey  an  accurate  notion  of  the  special  category  of  Quality, 
and  mark  it  off  from  the  other  accident-categories.  If  we  say 
with  Aristotle  that  quality  is  "  that  whereby  we  are  enabled  to 
describe  what  sort  (TTOIOV,  quale)  anything  is  "  * — e.g.  that  it  is 
white  by  whiteness,  strong  by  strength,  etc. — we  are  only  illus- 
trating the  abstract  by  the  concrete.  But  even  this  serves  the 
purpose  of  helping  us  to  realize  what  quality  in  general  means. 
For  we  are  more  familiar  with  the  concrete  than  with  the  ab- 
stract :  and  we  can  see  a  broad  distinction  between  the  question : 
"  What  sort  is  that  thing  ?  Qualis  est  ista  res  ? "  (Quality),  and 
the  question:  "How  large  is  that  thing?  Quanta  est  ista 
res?"  (Quantity),  or  "  Where  is  that  thing?"  (Place),  or  "What 
is  it  doing?  What  is  happening  to  it?"  (Actio  et  Passio\  or 
4 'What  does  it  resemble?"  (Relation},  etc.  This  will  help  us 
to  realize  that  there  are  accidental  modes  of  being  which  affect 
substances  in  a  different  way  from  all  the  extrinsic  denomina- 
tions of  the  latter  (60),  and  also  in  a  different  way  from  Quantity, 
Relation,  and  Causality  ;  and  these  modes  of  being,  whereby  the 
substance  is  of  such  a  sort,  or  in  such  a  condition,  we  call  qualities. 
And  if  we  inquire  what  special  kind  of  determination  of  the  sub- 
stance is  common  to  qualities,  and  marks  these  off  from  the  other 
accidents,  we  shall  find  it  to  consist  in  this,  that  quality  is  an  ac- 
cidental mode  of  being  which  so  affects  the  substance  that  it  dis- 
poses the  latter  well  or  ill  in  regard  to  the  perfections  natural  to 
this  particular  kind  of  substance :  it  alters  the  latter  accidentally 
by  increasing  or  diminishing  its  natural  perfection.  We  have 
seen  that  no  created  substance  has  all  the  perfection  natural  to  its 
kind,  teta  simul  or  ab  initio  (46) ;  that  it  fulfils  its  r61e  in  exist- 
ence by  development,  by  tending  towards  its  full  or  final  perfection. 
The  accidental  realities  which  supervene  on  its  essence,  and 
thus  alter  its  perfection  within  the  limits  of  its  kind  or  species, 
are  what  we  call  qualities.  They  diversify  the  substance  acci- 
dentally in  its  perfection,  in  its  concrete  mode  of  existing  and 
behaving:  by  their  appearance  and  disappearance  they  do  not 
change  the  essential  perfection  of  the  substance  (46),  they  do  not 
effect  a  substantial  change ;  but  they  change  its  intermediate, 

1  n<n<$T7jTa  8e  \eyu,  Kaff  %v  voioi  rivts  flvat  Xeyovrai. — Categ.,  ch.  iv.  Cf.  ST. 
THOMAS:  "  Haec  est  ratio  formalis  qualitatis,  per  quam  respondemus  interroganti 
qualis  res  sit." 


288  ONTOLOGY 

accidental  perfection ;  and  this  qualitative  change  is  technically 
known  and  described  as  alteration  1  (i  i). 

Hence  we  find  Quality  described  by  St.  Thomas  as  the  sort 
of  accident  which  modifies  or  disposes  the  substance  in  itself: 
"acddens  modificativum  seu  dispositivum  substantial  in  seipsa"  and 
by  Albertus  Magnus  somewhat  more  explicitly  as  "  the  sort  of 
accident  which  completes  and  perfects  substance  in  its  existence 
and  activity :  acddens  complens  ac  perfitiens  substantiam  tam  in 
existendo  quam  in  operando  ".2  This  notion  will  be  conveyed  with 
sufficient  clearness  if  we  describe  Quality  as  that  absolute  acddent 
which  determines  a  substance  after  the  manner  of  an  acddental 
"differentia"  affecting  the  essential  perfection  of  the  substance  in 
regard  to  its  existence  or  to  its  activity. 

Hence  (i)  the  Pure  Actuality  of  the  Infinitely  Perfect  Being 
cannot  admit  qualities,  inasmuch  as  quality  implies  only  a  re- 
lative and  limited  perfection ;  (2)  the  qualities  of  a  corporeal 
substance  are  grounded  in  the  formative  principle  which  gives 
that  substance  its  specific  nature  and  is  the  principle  of  its 
tendency  and  development  towards  its  final  perfection,  whereas 
its  quantity  is  grounded  in  its  determinable  or  material  principle ; 
(3)  the  essential  differentiating  principles  of  substances — being 
known  to  us  not  intuitively,  but  only  abstractively  and  discur- 
sively, i.e.  by  inference  from  the  behaviour  of  these  substances, 
from  the  effects  of  their  activities — are  often  designated  not  by 
what  constitutes  them  intrinsically,  but  by  the  accidental  perfec- 
tions or  qualities  which  are  our  only  key  to  a  knowledge  of  them. 
For  instance,  we  differentiate  the  nature  of  man  from  that  of  the 
brute  beast  by  describing  the  former  as  rational :  a  term  which 
really  designates  not  the  essence  or  nature  itself,  but  one  of  its 
fundamental  qualities,  viz.  the  faculty  of  reason. 

78.  IMMEDIATE  SUB-CLASSES  OF  QUALITY  AS  Genus  Supre- 
mum. — On  account  of  the  enormous  variety  of  qualities  which 
characterize  the  data  of  our  experience,  the  problem  of  classifying 
qualities  is  not  a  simple  one.  Its  details  belong  to  the  special 

1  The  other  accidents,  e.g.  actio  and  passio,  in  so  far  as  they  change  the  perfec- 
tion of  the  substance,  do  so  only  by  producing  qualities  in   it.      Quantity,  which 
is  the  connatural  accident  of  all  corporeal  substance,  adds  of  itself  no  special  comple- 
ment or  degree  of  accidental  perfection  to  the  latter,  in  the  sense  of  disposing  (or 
indisposing)  the  latter  for  the  attainment  of  the  full  and  final  perfection  due  to  its 
specific  nature ;    but  only  in  the  sense  that  it  supposes  more  or  less  of  that  kind  of 
substance  to  exist,  or  in  the  sense  in  which  it  is  understood  to  include  the  qualities 
of  which  it  may  be  the  immediate  subject. — C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  336. 

2  In  PraediCamenta,  ch.  i. 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY      289 

sciences  and  to  the  other  departments  of  philosophy.  Here  we 
must  confine  ourselves  to  an  attempt  at  indicating  the  immed- 
iate sub-classes  of  the  genus  supremum.  And  in  this  context 
it  will  not  be  out  of  place  to  call  attention  to  a  remarkable,  and 
in  our  view  quite  erroneous,  trend  of  modern  thought.  It 
accompanied  the  advent  of  what  is  known  as  atomism  or  the 
mechanical  conception  of  the  universe,  a  conception  much  in  vogue 
about  half  a  century  ago,  but  against  which  there  are  already 
abundant  evidences  of  a  strong  reaction.  We  refer  to  the  inclina- 
tion of  scientists  and  philosophers  to  eliminate  Quality  altogether 
as  an  ultimately  distinct  category  of  human  experience,  by  reducing 
all  qualities  to  quantity,  local  relations,  and  mechanical  or  spatial 
motions  of  matter  (cf.  1 1).  In  this  theory  all  the  sensible  qualities 
of  the  material  universe  would  be  really  and  objectively  nothing 
more  than  locations  and  motions  of  the  ultimate  constituents  of 
perceptible  matter.  All  the  chemical,  physical  and  mechanical 
energies  or  forces  of  external  nature  would  be  purely  quantitative 
dispositions  or  configurations  of  matter  in  motion :  realities  that 
could  be  exhaustively  known  by  mathematical  analysis  and 
measurement.  And  when  it  was  found  that  qualitative  concepts 
stubbornly  resisted  all  attempts  at  elimination,  or  reduction  to 
quantitative  concepts,  even  in  the  investigation  of  the  material 
universe  or  external  nature,  scientists  and  philosophers  of  ex- 
ternal nature  thought  to  get  rid  of  them  by  locating  them  ex- 
clusively in  the  human  mind,  and  thus  pushing  them  over  on 
psychologists  and  philosophers  of  the  mind  for  further  and  final 
exorcism.  For  a  time  extreme  materialists,  less  wise  than  daring, 
endeavoured  to  reduce  even  mind  and  all  its  conscious  states  and 
processes  to  a  mere  subjective  aspect  of  what,  looked  at  object- 
ively, would  be  merely  matter  in  motion.1  It  can  be  shown  in 
Cosmology,  Psychology,  and  Epistemology  that  all  such  attempts 
to  analyse  qualities  into  something  other  than  qualities,  are  utterly 
unsatisfactory  and  unsuccessful.  And  we  may  see  even  from  an 

lCf.  MAHER,  Psychology,  ch.  xii,  xiii,  xxiii,  xxv.  BERGSON  rightly  recognizes 
the  irreducibility  of  quality  to  quantity  (Essai  sur  les  donnees  immediate*  de  la  con- 
science, passim}.  But  he  wrongly  infers  from  this  "  fundamental  antinomy,"  as  he 
calls  it,  the  existence,  in  each  human  individual,  of  a  two-fold  Ego,  a  deeper  self 
where  all  is  quality,  and  a  superficial  self  which  projects  conscious  states,  in  static 
and  numerical  isolation  from  one  another,  into  a  homogeneous  space  where  all  is 
quantitative,  mathematical.  The  reasonable  inference  is  merely  that  the  human 
mind  recognizes  in  the  data  of  its  experience  a  certain  richness  and  variety  of 
modes  of  real  being. 

19 


290  ONTOLOGY 

enumeration  of  some  of  the  main  classes  of  qualities  that  such 
attempts  were  foredoomed  to  failure. 

Scholastic  Philosophy  has  generally  adopted  Aristotle's  divi- 
sion of  qualities  into  four  great  groups:1  (i)  eft?  fj  Stafocrt?, 
habitus  vel  dispositio ;  (2)  £uj/a/u?  (frvaritcr)  rj  aSwapia,  potentia 
naturalis  vel  impotentia ;  (3)  Trotor^re?  TraOijri/cai  KOL  nraOt], 
potentiae  passivae  et  passiones ;  (4)  fj,op<f)r)  17  o-^yiia,  forma  vel 
figura.  St.  Thomas  offers  the  following  ground  for  this  classifi- 
cation. Since  quality,  he  says,2  is  an  accidental  determination 
of  the  substance  itself,  i.e.  of  the  perfection  of  its  concrete 
existence  and  activity,  and  since  we  may  distinguish  four 
aspects  of  the  substance :  its  nature  itself  as  perfectible  ;  its 
intrinsic  principles  of  acting  and  receiving  action,  principles 
springing  from  the  formative,  specific  constituent  of  its  nature  ; 
its  receptivity  of  change  effected  by  such  action,  a  receptivity 
grounded  in  the  determinable  or  material  principle  of  its  nature ; 
and  finally  its  quantity,  if  it  be  a  corporeal  substance, — we  can 
likewise  distinguish  between  (i)  acquired  habits  or  dispositions, 
such  as  health,  knowledge,  virtue,  vice,  etc.,  which  immediately 
determine  the  perfection  of  the  substance,  disposing  it  well  or  ill 
in  relation  to  its  last  end ;  (2)  intrinsic  natural  forces,  faculties, 
powers  of  action,  aptitudes,  capacities,  such  as  intellect,  will, 
imagination,  instinct,  organic  vital  forces,  physical,  chemical, 
mechanical  energies  ;  (3)  states  resulting  in  a  corporeal  being 
from  the  action  of  its  milieu  upon  it :  the  passions  and  emotions 
of  sentient  living  things,  such  as  sensations  of  pleasure,  pain, 
anger,  etc.  ;  the  sensible  qualities  of  matter,  such  as  colour,  taste, 
smell,  temperature,  feel  or  texture,  etc.  ;  and,  finally  (4)  the 
quality  of  form  or  shape  which  is  a  mere  determination  of  the 
quantity  of  a  corporeal  substance. 

This  classification  is  not  indeed  perfect,  for  the  same  indi- 
vidual quality  can  be  placed  in  different  classes  when  looked  at 
from  different  standpoints :  heat,  for  instance,  may  be  regarded 
as  a  natural  operative  power  of  a  substance  in  a  state  of  combus- 
tion, or  as  a  sensible  quality  produced  in  that  substance  by  the 
operation  of  other  agencies.  But  it  has  the  merit  of  being  an 
exhaustive  classification ;  and  philosophers  have  not  succeeded 
in  improving  on  it. 

Qualities  of  the  third  and  fourth  class  do  not  call  for  special 

1  Metaph.  VM  ch.  xiv.,  where  the  four  groups  are  finally  reduced  to  two. 
*Summa  TheoL,  i»,  ii»e,  q.  49,  art.  2. 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY      291 

treatment.  In  the  third  class,  Aristotle's  distinction  between 
TroiorrjTes  TraQrjTi/cai  (qualitates  passibites)  and  TrdOrj  (J>assiones) 
is  based  upon  the  relatively  permanent  or  transient  character  of 
the  quality  in  question.  The  transient  quality,  such  as  the  blush 
produced  by  shame  or  the  pallor  produced  by  fear,  would  be  a 
passio-^  whereas  the  more  permanent  quality,  such  as  the 
natural  colour  of  the  countenance,  would  be  a  passibilis  qualitas. 
The  "  passions  "  or  sensible  changes  which  result  from  certain 
conscious  states,  and  affect  the  organism  of  the  sentient  living 
being,  are  included  in  this  class  zs  passiones  ;  while  the  visible 
manifestations  of  more  permanent  mental  derangement  or  in- 
sanity would  be  included  in  it  as  passibiles  qualitates.  We  may, 
perhaps,  get  a  fairly  clear  and  comprehensive  notion  of  all  that  is 
contained  in  this  class  as  "  sensible  qualities  "  by  realizing  that 
these  embrace  whatever  is  the  immediate  cause  or  the  immediate 
result  of  the  sense  modification  involved  in  any  act  or  process  of 
sense  consciousness.  Such  "  sensible  qualities,"  therefore,  belong 
in  part  to  the  objects  which  provoke  sense  perception,  and  in 
part  to  the  sentient  subject  which  elicits  the  conscious  act.  One 
of  the  most  important  problems  in  the  Theory  of  Knowledge, 
and  one  which  ramifies  into  Cosmology  and  Psychology,  is  that 
of  determining  the  precise  significance  of  these  "sensible 
qualities," — and  especially  in  determining  whether  they  are 
qualities  of  an  extramental  reality,  or  merely  states  of  the 
individual  mind  or  consciousness  itself. 

Form  or  figure,  which  constitutes  the  fourth  class  of  quality,  is  a 
mode  of  the  quantity  of  a  body,  being  merely  the  particular  surface 
termination  of  its  extension  or  volume.  Considered  as  a  mode 
of  abstract  or  mathematical  quantity,  it  belongs  to  the  domain 
of  mathematics.  Considered  in  the  concrete  body,  it  is  the 
physical,  sensible  form,  shape,  or  figure,  of  the  latter;  and  here 
it  may  be  either  natural  or  artificial,  according  as  it  results  from 
the  unimpeded  action  of  natural  forces  or  from  these  forces  as 
manipulated  and  directed  by  intelligent  agents.  It  is  worthy  of 
special  note  that  while  extension  or  volume  is  indicative  of  the 
material  principle  of  corporeal  substances,  the  figure  or  shape 
naturally  assumed  by  this  volume  is  determined  by  their  forma- 
tive  principle,  and  is  thus  indicative  of  their  specific  nature.  This 

xTo  be  distinguished  from  the  passio  which  is  correlative  of  actlo  and  which 
consists  in  the  actual  undergoing  of  the  latter,  the  actual  reception  of  the  accidental 
form  which  is  the  term  of  the  latter. 


292  ONTOLOGY 

is  already  noticeable  in  the  inorganic  world,  where  many  of  the 
chemically  different  substances  assume  each  its  own  distinctive 
crystalline  form.  But  it  is  particularly  in  the  domains  of  botany 
and  zoology  that  the  natural  external  form  of  the  living  indi- 
vidual organism  is  recognized  as  one  of  the  most  important 
grounds  of  its  classification  and  one  of  the  surest  tests  of  its 
specific  nature.1 

79.  HABITS  AND  DISPOSITIONS. — Every  created  being  is 
subject  to  change,  capable  of  development  or  retrogression,  en- 
dowed with  a  natural  tendency  towards  some  end  which  it  can  reach 
by  a  natural  process  of  activity,  and  which  constitutes  for  it,  when 
attained,  its  full  and  final  perfection  (66).  Through  this  process 
of  change  it  acquires  accidental  modes  of  being  which  help  it  or 
hinder  it,  dispose  it  or  indispose  it,  in  the  exercise  of  its  natural  ac- 
tivities, and  therefore  also  in  the  concrete  perfection  of  its  nature  as 
tending  towards  its  natural  end.  Such  an  accidental  mode  of 
being  is  acquired  by  a  series  of  transient  actions  and  experiences, 
actiones  etpassiones :  after  these  have  passed  away  it  remains,  and 
not  merely  as  a  state  or  condition  resulting  from  the  changes 
wrought  in  the  subject  by  these  experiences,  but  as  a  disposition 
towards  easier  repetition  of  such  experiences.  Moreover,  it  may 
be  not  a  mere  transient  disposition,  but  something  stable  and 
permanent,  not  easily  removed  or  annulled,  a  dispositio  difficile 
mobilis.  And  just  as  it  is  essentially  indicative  of  past  actions 
whereby  it  was  acquired,  so,  too,  the  very  raison  d'etre  of  its  actu- 
ality is  to  dispose  its  subject  for  further  and  future  changes, 
for  operations  and  effects  which  are  not  yet  actual  but  only 
potential  in  this  subject.  Such  an  accidental  mode  of  being  is 
what  Aristotle  called  eft?,  and  the  scholastics  habitus.  With 
Aristotle,  they  define  habit  as  a  more  or  less  stable  disposition 
whereby  a  subject  is  well  or  ill  disposed  in  itself  or  in  relation  to 
other  things  :  Habitus  dicitur  dispositio  difficile  mobilis  secundum 
quam  bene  vel  male  disponitur  subjectum  aut  secundum  se  aut  in 
or  dine  ad  aliud? 

1 "  Inter  omnes  qualitates,  figurae  maxime  sequuntur  et  demonstrant  speciem 
return.  Quod  maxime  in  plantis  et  animalibus  patet,  in  quibus  nullo  certiori  indicio 
diversitas  specierum  dijudicari  potest,  quam  diversitate  figurae." — ST.  THOMAS, 
In  VII.  Physic,  lect.  5. 

3  Every  natural  habit,  as  we  have  just  seen,  has  an  essential  relation  to  activity. 
Every  such  habit  inheres  immediately  in  some  operative  faculty,  as  science  in  the 
intellect,  or  justice  in  the  will.  All  natural  habits  are  operative.  There  is,  however, 
as  we  know  from  Divine  Revelation,  an  "  entitative  "  habit,  a  habitus  entitativus,  which 
affects  the  substance  itself  of  the  human  soul,  ennobling  its  natural  mode  of  being 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY      293 

The  difference  between  a  habit  (eft?)  and  a  simple  disposition 
(bidOecris)  is  that  the  former  is  by  nature  a  more  or  less  stable 
quality  while  the  latter  is  unstable  and  transient.  Moreover,  the 
facilities  acquired  by  repeated  action  of  the  organs  or  members 
of  men  or  animals,  and  the  particular  "  set "  acquired  by  certain 
tools  or  instruments  from  continued  use,  are  more  properly  called 
dispositions  than  habits :  they  are  not  habits  in  the  strict  sense, 
though  they  are  often  called  habits  in  the  ordinary  and  looser 
usage  of  common  speech.  A  little  reflection  will  show  that  the 
only  proper  subjects  of  natural  habits  in  the  strict  sense  are  the 
spiritual  faculties  of  an  intelligent  and  free  agent. 

Since  all  natural  habits  are  acquired  by  the  past  activities, 
and  dispose  for  the  future  activities,  of  a  being  not  absolutely 
perfect,  but  partly  potential  and  partly  actual,  and  subject  to 
change,  it  follows  that  only  finite  beings  can  have  habits.  But, 
furthermore,  beings  that  are  not  free,  that  have  not  control  or 
dominion  of  their  own  actions,  that  have  not  freedom  of  choice, 
are  determined  by  their  nature,  by  a  necessary  law  of  their  activity, 
to  elicit  the  actions  which  they  do  actually  elicit :  such  beings 
are  by  their  nature  determinata  ad  unum ;  they  are  confined 
necessarily  to  the  particular  lines  of  action  whereby  they  fulfil 
their  role  in  the  actual  order  of  things.  As  Aristotle  remarks, 
you  may  throw  the  same  stone  repeatedly  in  the  same  direction 
and  with  the  same  velocity :  it  will  never  acquire  a  habit  of  moving 
in  that  direction  with  that  velocity. l  The  same  is  true  of  plants 
and  animals ;  for  a  habit  in  the  strict  sense  implies  not  merely  a 
certain  mutability  in  its  subject ;  it  implies,  and  consists  in,  a 
stable  modification  of  some  power  or  faculty  which  can  have  its 
activities  directed  indifferently  in  one  or  other  of  a  variety  of  channels 
or  lines :  the  power  or  faculty  which  is  the  proper  subject  of  a 
habit  must  be  a  potentia  dirigibilis  vel  determinabilis  ad  diversa. 
Hence  merely  material  powers  of  action — such  as  the  mechan- 
ical, physical  and  chemical  forces  of  inorganic  nature,  or  the 
organic  powers  of  living  bodies,  whether  vegetative  or  merely 
sentient, — since  they  are  all  of  themselves,  of  their  nature, 
determined  to  certain  lines  of  action,  and  to  these  only, — such 
powers  cannot  become  the  subjects  of  habits,  of  stable  disposi- 
tions towards  one  line  of  action  rather  than  another.  "The 

and  so  perfecting  it  as  to  raise  it  to  a  higher  or  supernatural  plane  of  being,  to  an  order 
of  existence  altogether  undue  to  its  nature  :  the  supernaturally  infused  habit  of  sanctify- 
ing grace. 

lEth.  Eud.,  ii.,  2. 


294  ONTOLOGY 

powers  of  material  nature,"  says  St.  Thomas,  "do  not  elicit  their 
operations  by  means  of  habits,  for  they  are  of  themselves  [already 
adequately]  determined  to  their  particular  lines  of  action."1 

Only  the  spiritual  faculties  of  free  agents  are,  then,  the  proper 
seat  of  real  habits.  Only  of  free  agents  can  we  say  strictly  that 
"  habit  is  second  nature  ".  Only  these  can  direct  the  operations 
of  their  intellect  and  will,  and  through  these  latter  the  operations 
of  their  sense  faculties,  both  cognitive  and  appetitive,  in  a  way 
conducive  to  their  last  end  or  in  a  way  that  deviates  therefrom, 
by  attaching  their  intellects  to  truth  or  to  error,  their  wills  to 
virtue  or  to  vice,  and  thus  forming  in  these  faculties  stable  dis- 
positions or  habits. 2 

Is  there  any  sense,  then,  in  which  we  can  speak  of  the  sen- 
tient (cognitive  and  appetitive)  and  executive  powers  of  man  as  the 
seat  of  habits  ?  The  activities  of  those  faculties  are  under  the 
control  of  intellect  and  will ;  the  acts  elicited  by  the  former  are 
commanded  by  the  latter ;  they  are  acts  that  issue  primarily  from 
the  latter  faculties ;  and  hence  the  dispositions  that  result  from 
repetition  of  these  acts  and  give  a  facility  for  further  repetition  of 
them — acts  of  talking,  walking,  singing,  playing  musical  instru- 
ments, exercising  any  handicraft — are  partly,  though  only 
secondarily,  dispositions  formed  in  these  sentient  faculties  (the 
"  trained  "  eye,  the  "  trained  "  ear,  the  "  discriminating  "  sense  of 
taste,  the  "  alert "  sense  of  touch  in  the  deaf,  dumb,  or  blind),  or 
in  these  executive  powers,  whereby  the  latter  more  promptly  and 
easily  obey  the  <(  command  "  of  the  higher  faculties  ;  but  they  are 
primarily  and  principally  habits  of  these  higher  faculties  themselves 
rendering  the  latter  permanently  "  apt "  to  "  command "  and 
utilize  the  subordinate  powers  in  the  repetition  of  such  acts. 3 

1 "  Vires  naturales  non  agunt  operationes  suas  mediantibus  aliquibus  habitibus, 
quia  secundum  seipsas  sunt  determinatae  ad  unum." — Snmma  Theol.,  ia  ii*,  q.  49,  art. 
4,  ad  2. 

2  "  Intellectus  .  .  .  est  subjectum  habitus.  Illi  enim  competit  esse  subjectum 
habitus  quod  est  in  potentia  ad  multa;  et  hoc  maxime  competit  intellectui.  ,  .  ." — 
St.  THOMAS,  Stimma  Theol.,  ia,  ii  e,  q.  50,  art.  4,  ad.  i.  "  Omnis  potentia  quae  diversi- 
mode  potest  ordinari  ad  agendum,  indiget  habitu,  quo  bene  disponatur  ad  suum 
actum.  Voluntas  autem  cum  sit  potenia  rationalis,  diversimode  potest  ad  agendum 
ordinari :  et  ideo  oportet  in  voluntate  aliquem  habitum  ponere,  quo  bene  disponatur 
ad  suum  actum.  .  .  ," — ibid.  art.  5,  in  c. 

3 "  Habitualis  dispositio  requiritur  ubi  i  subjectum  est  in  potentia  ad  multa. 
Operationes  vero  quae  sunt  ab  anima  per  corpus,  principaliter  quidem  sunt  ipsius 
animae,  secundario  vero  ipsius  corporis.  Habitus  autem  proportionantur  opera- 
tionibus  ;  unde  ex  similibus  actibus  similes  habitus  causantur,  ut  dicitur  in  2  Ethic., 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY      295 

Unquestionably  the  bodily  organs  acquire  by  exercise  a  definite 
"set"  which  facilitates  their  further  exercise.  But  this  "set"  is 
not  something  that  they  can  use  themselves ;  nor  is  it  something 
that  removes  or  lessens  a  natural  indeterminateness  or  indiffer- 
ence of  these  powers  ;  for  they  are  not  indifferent :  they  must  act, 
at  any  instant,  in  the  one  way  which  their  concrete  nature  in  all 
its  surroundings  actually  demands.  They  themselves  are  only 
instruments  of  the  higher  faculties ;  these  alone  have  freedom  of 
choice  between  lines  of  action  ;  it  is  only  the  stable  modifications 
which  these  acquire,  which  they  themselves  can  use,  and  which 
dispose  them  by  lessening  their  indeterminateness,  that  are  properly 
called  habits.  There  are,  therefore,  in  the  organic  faculties  ot 
man  dispositions  which  give  facility  of  action.  There  are,  more- 
over, organic  dispositions  which  dispose  the  organism  not  for 
action  but  for  its  union  with  the  formative  principle  or  soul : 
habituales  dispositiones  mater iae  ad  formam. J  Aristotle  gives 
as  instances  bodily  health  or  beauty. 2  But  these  dispositiones 
materiales  ad  formam  he  does  not  call  habits,  any  more  than  the 
organic  dispositiones  ad  operationem  just  referred  to  :  and  for  this 
reason,  that  although  all  these  dispositions  have  a  certain  degree 
of  stability  in  the  organism — a  stability  which  they  derive, 
moreover,  from  the  soul  which  is  the  formative  principle  that 
secures  the  continuity  and  individual  identity  of  the  organism, — 
yet  they  are  not  of  themselves,  of  their  own  nature,  stable ; 
whereas  the  acquired  dispositions  of  the  spiritual  faculties,  intellect 
and  will,  rooted  as  they  are  in  a  subject  that  is  spiritual  and 
substantially  immutable,  are  of  their  own  nature  stable  and  per- 
manent. Nor  are  all  dispositions  of  these  latter  faculties  to  be 
deemed  habits,  but  only  those  which  arise  from  acts  which  give 
them  the  special  character  of  stability.  Hence  mere  opinion  in 
the  intellectual  order,  as  distinct  from  science,  or  a  mere  inclina- 

cap.  i  et  2 ;  in  corpore  vero  possunt  esse  secundario,  inquantum  scilicet  corpus 
disponitur  et  habilitatur  ad  prompte  deserviendum  operationibus  animae." — Summa 
Theoi.,  ia  ii*,  q.  49,  art.  i,  in  c. 

1  C/.  St.  THOMAS,  ibid.,  q.  50,  art.  i. — MERCIER,  Ontologie,  §  164. 

2  According  to  the  scholastic  theory  of  matter  and  form  the  matter  must  be 
predisposed  by  certain  qualities  for  the  reception  of  a  given  substantial  form.     The 
chemical  elements  which  form  a  compound  will  not  do  so  in  any  and  every  con- 
dition, but  only  when  definitely  disposed  and    brought  together  under  favourable 
conditions.     These  elementary  qualities,  considered   in  themselves,  are  not  habits 
or  dispositions :     "  Unde  qualitates  simplices  elementorum,  quae  secundum  unum 
modum  determinatum  naturis  elementorum  conveniunt,  non  dicimus  dispositiones 
vel  habitus,  sed  simplices  qualitates." — ST.  THOMAS,  ibid.,  q.  49,  art.  4,  in  C.     They 
are  natural  qualities  and  not  dispositions  produced  by  disposing  causes. 


296  ONTOLOGY 

tion  resulting  from  a  few  isolated  acts,  as  distinct  from  a  virtue 
or  a  vice  in  the  moral  order,  are  not  habits. 1  Habits,  therefore, 
belong  properly  to  the  faculties  of  a  spiritual  substance  ;  indirectly, 
however,  they  extend  their  influence  to  the  lower  or  organic 
powers  dependent  on,  and  controlled  by,  the  spiritual  faculties. 

To  the  various  dispositions  and  facilities  of  action  acquired  by 
animals  through  "  training,"  "  adaptation,"  "acclimatization,"  etc., 
we  may  apply  what  has  been  said  in  regard  to  the  sense  faculties 
and  executive  powers  of  the  human  body.  Just  as  we  may 
regard  the  internal  sense  faculties  (memory,  imagination,  sense 
appetite)  in  man  as  in  a  secondary  and  subordinate  way  subjects  of 
habits,  in  so  far  as  these  faculties  act  under  the  direction  and  control 
of  human  reason  and  will,2  so  also  the  organic  dispositions  induced 
in  irrational  animals  by  the  direction  and  guidance  of  human 
reason  may  indeed  be  regarded  as  extensions  or  effects  of  the 
habits  that  dispose  the  rational  human  faculties,  but  not  as  them- 
selves in  the  strict  sense  habits.3 

If,  then,  habits  belong  properly  to  intellect  and  will,  and  if  their 
function  is  to  dispose  or  indispose  the  human  agent  for  the  attain- 
ment of  the  perfection  in  which  his  last  end  consists,  we  must 
naturally  look  to  Psychology  and  Ethics  for  a  detailed  analysis  of 

1  St.  Thomas  regards  the  distinction  between  habits  and  mere  dispositions  as  a 
distinction  not  of  degree  but  of  kind :     "  Dispositio  et   habitus  possunt  distingui 
sicut    diversae   species   unius    generis   subalterni,   ut    dicantur  disposition's    illae 
qualitates  primae  speciei  quibus  convenit  secundum  propriam  rationem  ut  de  facili 
amittantur,  quia  habent  causas  mutabiles,  ut  aegritudo  et  sanitas ;  habitus  vero 
dicantur  illae  qualitates  quae  secundum  suam  rationem  habent  quod  non  de  facili 
transmutentur  quia  habent  causas  immobiles ;  sicut  scientia  et  virtutes ;  et  secund- 
um hoc  disposito  non  fit  habitus." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  ia,  ii86,  q.  49,  art. 
2,  ad.  3. 

2  "Vires  sensitivae  dupliciter  possunt  considerari :  uno  modo,  secundum  quod 
operantur  ex  instinctu  naturae;  olio  modo,  secundum  quod  operantur  ex  imperio 
rationis.     Secundum  igitur  quod  operantur  ex  instinctu  naturae,  sic  ordinantur  ad 
unum,  sicut  et  natura ;  et  ideo  sicut  in  potentiis  naturalibus  non  sunt  aliqui  habitus, 
ita  etiam  nee  in  potentiis  sensitivis,  secundum  quod  ex  instinctu  naturae  operantur. 
Secundum  vero  quod  operantur  ex  imperio  rationis,  sic  ad  diversa  ordinari  possunt : 
et  sic  possunt  esse  in  eis  aliqui  habitus,  quibus  bene  autmalead  aliquiddisponuntur." 
— ST.  THOMAS,  ibid.,  q.  50,  art.  3,  in  c.     In  this  context  the  angelic  doctor,  following 
Aristotle,  places  the  virtues  of  temperance  and  fortitude  in  the  sense  appetite  as 
controlled  by  the  rational  will.     For  the  same  reason  he  admits  the  possibility  of 
habits  in  the  faculties  of  internal  sense  perception,  though  not  in  the  external  senses 
(ibid.,  ad.  3). 

3  "  Quia  bruta  animalia  a  ratione   hominis  per  quandam  consuetudinem   dis- 
ponuntur  ad  aliquid  operandum  sic,  vel  aliter,  hoc  modo  in  brutis  animalibus  habitus 
quodammodo  poni  possunt.  .  .  .  Deficit  tamen  ratio  habitus  quantum  ad  usum  volun- 
tatis  quia  non  habent  dominium  utendi  vel  non  utendi,  quod  videtur  ad  rationem 
habitus  pertinere;  et  ideo,  proprie  loquendo,  in  eis  habitus  esse  non  possunt." — ibid., 
ad.  2. 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY      297 

them.      Here  we  must  be  content  with  a  word  on  their  origin, 
their  effects,  and  their  importance. 

Habits  are  produced  by  acts.  The  act  modifies  the  faculty. 
If,  for  instance,  nothing  remained  in  our  cognitive  faculties  after 
each  transient  cognitive  act  had  passed,  memory  would  be 
inexplicable  and  knowledge  impossible ;  nor  could  the  repetition 
of  any  act  ever  become  easier  than  its  first  performance.  This 
something  that  remains  is  a  habit,  or  the  beginning  of  a  habit. 
A  habit  may  be  produced  by  a  single  act :  the  mind's  first  intui- 
tion of  an  axiom  or  principle  produces  a  habit  or  habitual  knowledge 
of  that  principle.  But  as  a  rule  it  requires  a  repetition  of  any  act, 
and  that  for  a  long  time  at  comparatively  short  intervals,  to 
produce  a  habit  of  that  act,  a  stable  disposition  whereby  it  can  be 
readily  repeated  ;  and  to  strengthen  and  perfect  the  habit  the  acts 
must  be  formed  with  a  growing  degree  of  intensity  and  energy. 
Progress  in  virtue  demands  sustained  and  increasingly  earnest 
efforts. 

The  natural  effect  of  habit  is  to  perfect  the  faculty,1  to  increase 
its  energy,  to  make  it  more  prompt  to  act,  and  thus  to  facilitate 
the  performance  of  the  act  for  which  the  habit  disposes  it.  It 
also  engenders  and  develops  a  natural  need  or  tendency  or  desire  to 
repeat  the  act,  and  a  natural  aversion  from  the  acts  opposed 
to  the  habit.  Finally,  according  as  the  habit  grows,  the  per- 
formance of  the  act  demands  less  effort,  calls  for  less  actual 
attention  ;  thus  the  habit  diminishes  the  feeling  of  effort  and  tends 
to  bring  about  a  quasi-automatic  and  semi-conscious  form  of 
activity. 

Good  habits  are  those  which  perfect  the  nature  of  the  agent, 
which  advance  it  towards  the  realization  of  its  end  ;  bad  habits 
are  those  which  retard  and  prevent  the  realization  of  this  end. 
Hence  the  ethical  importance,  to  the  human  person,  of  forming, 
fostering  and  confirming  good  habits,  as  also  of  avoiding,  resist- 
ing and  eradicating  bad  habits,  can  scarcely  be  exaggerated. 

1  It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  habit  is  an  accident,  an  accidental  perfection  of 
the  substance  or  nature  of  an  individual  agent ;  it  immediately  affects  the  operative 
power  of  the  agent,  which  operative  power  is  itself  an  accident  of  this  agent's  nature 
(constituting  the  second  sub-class  of  the  accident,  Quality).  Habit  is  thus  at  once 
an  actuality  or  actualization  of  the  operative  power  and  a  potentiality  of  further  and 
more  perfect  acts.  It  is  intermediate  between  the  operative  power  and  the  complete 
actualization  which  the  power  receives  by  the  acts  that  spring  from  the  latter  as 
perfected  by  the  habit.  Faculty  and  habit  form  one  complete  proximate  principle 
of  those  acts :  a  principle  which  is  at  once  a  partial  actualization  of  the  individua 
agent's  nature  and  a  potentiality  of  further  actualization  of  this  nature. 


298  ONTOLOGY 

The  profound  and  all-pervading  influence  of  habit  in  the  mental 
and  moral  life  of  man  is  unfortunately  far  from  being  adequately 
appreciated  even  by  those  responsible  for  the  secular,  moral  and 
religious  education  of  the  young.  This  is  perhaps  mainly  due 
to  the  fact  that  the  influence  of  habit  on  the  conduct  of  life, 
enormous  as  it  is  in  fact,  is  so  secret,  so  largely  unconscious,  that 
it  easily  escapes  notice.  Careful  reflection  on  our  actions, 
diligent  study  of  the  springs  of  action  in  our  everyday  life,  are 
needed  to  reveal  this  influence.  But  the  more  we  analyse 
human  conduct  in  ourselves  and  others,  the  more  firmly  convinced 
we  become  that  human  character  and  conduct  are  mainly 
dependent  on  the  formation  of  habits.  Habits  are  the  grand 
conserving  and  perfecting — or  the  terrible  undermining  and 
destroying — force  of  life.  They  are  the  fruit  of  our  past  and  the 
seed  of  our  future.  In  them  the  words  of  Leibniz  find  their 
fullest  verification :  "  the  present  is  laden  with  the  past  and 
pregnant  with  the  future".  By  forming  good  habits  we  escape 
the  disheartening  difficulties  of  perpetual  beginnings ;  and  thus 
the  labour  we  devote  to  the  acquisition  of  wisdom  and  virtue  has 
its  first  rich  recompense  in  the  facility  it  gives  us  to  advance  on 
the  path  of  progress. 

It  has  been  truly  and  rightly  said  that  all  genuine  education 
consists  in  the  formation  of  good  habits. 

80.  POWERS,  FACULTIES  AND  FORCES. — A  natural  operative 
power,  faculty,  or  force  (Bvvapis,  potentia,  facultas,  virtus  agendi) 
is  a  quality  which  renders  the  nature  of  the  individual  agent  apt  to 
elicit  certain  actions.  By  impotence  or  incapacity  (aBwapfa,  im- 
potentia,  incapdcitas)  Aristotle  meant  not  an  opposite  kind  of 
quality,  in  contradistinction  to  power  or  faculty,  but  only  a 
power  of  a  weaker  order,  differing  in  degree,  not  in  kind,  from  the 
real  power  which  renders  an  agent  proximately  capable  of  acting  ; 
such  weaker  capacities,  for  instance,  as  the  infant's  power  to  walk, 
or  the  defective  eyesight  of  the  aged. 

It  is  to  the  individual  subsisting  person  or  thing  that  all  the 
actions  proceeding  from  the  latter  are  ascribed  :  actiones  sunt 
suppositorum  :  the  "  suppositum "  or  person  is  the  principium 
QUOD  agit.  And  it  acts  in  accordance  with  its  nature ;  this  latter 
is  the  principium  QUO  agens  agit :  the  nature  is  the  substance  or 
essence  as  a  principle  of  the  actions  whereby  the  individual  tends 
to  realize  its  end.  But  is  a  created,  finite  nature  the  immediate  or 
proximate  principle  of  its  activities,  so  that  it  is  operative  per  se  ? 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY       299 

Or  is  it  only  their  remote  principle,  eliciting  them  not  by  itself  but 
only  by  means  of  powers,  faculties,  forces,  which  are  themselves 
accidental  perfections  of  the  substance  and  really  distinct  from 
it,  qualities  intermediate  between  the  latter  and  its  actions,  being 
the  proximate  principles  of  the  latter  ? 

No  doubt  when  any  individual  nature  is  acted  upon  by  other 
agencies,  when  it  undergoes  real  change  under  the  influence  of 
its  environment,  its  passive  potentiality  is  being  so  far  forth 
actualized.  Moreover  when  the  nature  itself  acts  immanently, 
the  term  of  such  action  remaining  within  the  agent  itself  to 
actualize  or  perfect  it,  some  passive  potentiality  of  the  agent  is 
being  actualized.  In  these  cases  the  nature  before  being  thus 
actualized  was  really  capable  of  such  actualization.  This  passive 
potentiality,  however,  is  itself  nothing  actual,  it  implies  no  actual 
perfection  in  the  nature.  But  we  must  distinguish  carefully  from 
this  passive  or  receptive  potentiality  of  a  nature  its  active  or 
operative  powers — potentiae  operativae.  These  may  be  themselves 
actual  perfections  in  the  nature,  accidental  perfections  actually  in 
the  nature,  and  perhaps  really  distinct  from  it. 

That  they  are  indeed  actual  perfections  of  the  nature  is  fairly 
obvious  :  it  is  an  actual  perfection  of  a  nature  to  be  proximately 
and  immediately,  and  without  any  further  complement  or  addition 
to  its  reality,  capable  of  acting ;  and  this  is  true  whether  the 
action  in  question  be  immanent  or  transitive  :  if  it  be  ttnmanent, 
the  perfection  resulting  from  the  action,  the  term  of  the  latter, 
will  be  a  perfection  of  the  agent  itself,  and  in  this  case  the  agent 
by  virtue  of  its  operative  power  will  have  had  the  capacity  of  per- 
fecting itself ;  while  if  the  action  be  transitive  the  agent  will  have 
had,  in  virtue  of  its  operative  power,  the  capacity  of  producing  per- 
fections in  other  things.  In  either  case  such  capacity  is  un- 
doubtedly an  actual  perfection  of  the  agent  that  possesses  it. 
Hence  the  truth  of  the  scholastic  formula  :  Omne  agens  agit  in 
quantime  est  in  ACTU,  patitur  vero  inquantum  est  in  POTENTIA. 

Furthermore,  all  such  operative  powers  are  really  distinct  from 
the  actions  which  immediately  proceed  from  them  :  this,  too,  is 
obvious,  for  while  the  operative  power  is  a  stable,  abiding 
characteristic  of  the  agent,  the  actions  elicited  by  means  of  it  are 
transient. 

But  what  is  the  nature  of  this  operative  power  in  relation  to 
the  nature  itself  of  the  agent?  It  is  an  actual  perfection  of  this 
nature.  It  is,  moreover,  unlike  acquired  habits,  native  to  this 


300  ONTOLOGY 

nature,  born  with  it  so  to  speak,  naturally  inseparable  from  it. 
Further  still,  operative  powers  would  seem  to  be  all  properties 
(69)  of  their  respective  natures ;  inasmuch  as  it  is  only  in  virtue 
of  the  operative  power  that  the  nature  can  act,  and  there  can  be 
no  nature  without  connatural  operations  whereby  it  tends  to 
realize  the  full  andfinat  perfection  of  its  being,  the  perfection  which 
is  the  very  raison  d'etre  of  its  presence  in  the  actual  order  of  things. 
The  question  therefore  narrows  itself  down  to  this  :  Are  operative 
powers,  which  perfect  the  nature  of  which  they  are  properties,  really 
distinct  from  this  nature,  or  are  they  only  virtually  distinct  aspects 
under  which  we  view  the  nature  itself?  For  example,  when  we 
speak  of  intellect  and  will  as  being  faculties  of  the  human  soul, 
do  we  merely  mean  that  intellect  is  the  soul  itself  regarded  as 
capable  of  reasoning,  and  will  the  soul  itself  regarded  as  capable 
of  willing  ?  Or  do  we  mean  that  the  soul  is  not  by  itself  and  in 
virtue  of  its  own  essence  capable  of  reasoning  and  willing ;  that  it 
can  reason  and  will  only  through  the  instrumentality  of  two 
realities  of  the  accidental  order,  really  distinct  from,  though  at 
the  same  time  necessarily  rooted  in  and  springing  from,  the  sub- 
stance of  the  soul  itself :  realities  which  we  empowers  or  faculties  ? 
Or  again,  when  we  speak  of  a  man  or  an  animal  as  having  various 
sense  faculties — internal  and  external,  cognitive,  appetitive,  execu- 
tive— do  we  merely  mean  that  the  living,  sentient  organism  is  itself 
directly  capable  of  eliciting  acts  of  various  kinds  :  of  imagining, 
desiring,  seeing,  hearing,  etc.  ?  Or  do  we  mean  that  the  organism 
can  elicit  these  various  acts  only  by  means  of  several  accidental 
realities,  really  distinct  from,  and  inhering  in,  itself? 

If  such  operative  powers  or  faculties  are  naturally  inseparable 
from  the  substance  in  which  they  inhere,  if  they  are  so  necessarily 
consequent  on  the  nature  of  the  latter  that  it  cannot  exist  without 
them,  are  they  anything  more  than  virtually  distinct  aspects  of  the 
substance  itself?  On  this  question,  as  we  have  already  seen  (69), 
scholastics  are  not  agreed.  St.  Thomas,  and  Thomists  generally, 
maintain  that  intellect  and  will  are  really  distinct  from  the  sub- 
stance of  the  soul,  and  likewise  that  the  sense  faculties  are  really 
distinct  from  the  substance  of  the  animated  organism  in  which 
they  inhere.1  In  this  view  the  distinction  is  not  merely  a  virtual 
distinction  between  different  aspects  of  the  soul  (or  the  organism) 

144  Si  potentie  animae  non  sunt  ipsa  essentia  animae,  sequitur  quod  sint  ac- 
cidentia  in  aliquo  novem  generum  contenta.  Suntenim  in  secunda  specie  qualitatis, 
quae  dicitur  potentia  vel  impotentia  naturalis." — Q.  Disfi.  de  Spir.  Great.,  art.  n,  in  c 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY       301 


itself,  grounded  in  the  variety  and  complexity  of  the  acts  which 
emanate  from  the  latter :  the  faculties  are  real  entities  of  the  ac- 
cidental order,  mediating  between  the  substance  and  its  actions, 
and  involving  in  the  concrete  being  a  plurality  which,  however, 
is  not  incompatible  with  the  real  unity  of  the  latter  (69). 

The  following  are  some  of  the  arguments  urged  in  proof  of  a 
real  distinction : — 

(a)  Existence  and  action  are  two  really  distinct  actualities ; 
therefore  the  potentialities  which  they  actualize  must  be  really 
distinct:  for  such  is  the  transcendental  relation  between  the 
potential  and  the  actual  that  any  potential  subject  and  the  corres- 
ponding perfection  which  actualizes  it  must  belong  to  the  same 
genus  supremum :  the  one  cannot  be  a  substance  and  the  other 
an  accident.1  Now  existence  is  the  actuality  of  essence  and 
action  is  the  actuality  of  operative  power  or  faculty.  But  action  is 
certainly  an  accident ;  therefore  the  operative  power  which  it  act- 
ualizes must  also  be  an  accident,  and  must  therefore  be  really 
distinct  from  the  substance  of  which  it  is  a  power,  and  of  which 
existence  is  the  actuality.  This  line  of  argument  applies  with 
equal  force  to  all  created  natures.2 

In  the  Infinite  Being  alone  are  operation  and  substance  iden- 
tical. No  creature  is  operative  in  virtue  of  its  substance.  The 
actions  of  a  creature  cannot  be  actualizations  of  its  substance : 
existence  is  the  actualization  of  its  substance  ;  therefore  its  actions 
must  be  actualizations  of  potentialities  which  are  accidents  distinct 
from  its  substance ;  in  other  words,  of  operative  powers  which 
belong  indeed  necessarily  to  its  substance  but  are  really  distinct 
from  the  latter. 

This  argument  rests  on  very  ultimate  metaphysical  concep- 
tions. But  not  all  scholastics  will  admit  the  assumptions  it  in- 
volves. How,  for  instance,  does  it  appear  that  the  created  or 

1  C/.  ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  76,  art.  i,  in  c. — "  Cum  potentia  et  actus 
dividant  ens,  et  quodlibet  genus  entis,  opportet  quod  ad  idem  genus  referatur  potentia 
et  actus ;  et  ideo  si  actus  non  est  in  genere  substantiae,  potentia,  quse  dictur  ad  ilium 
actum,  non   potest  esse  in  genere  substantiae.     Operatic  autem  animae  non  est  in 
genere  substantiae,  sed  in  solo  Deo,  cujus  operatic  est  ejus  substantial' — C/.  ZIQLIARA, 
Ontolo°ia  (g),  xi. :  "  Actus  et  potentia  essentialiter  ad  ilium  actum  ordinata  sunt  in 
eodem  genere  supremo." 

2  •«  Nee  in  angelo,  nee  in  aliqua  creatura,  virtus  vel  potentia  operativa  est  idem 
quod  sua  essentia.  .  .  .  Actus  ad  quem  comparatur  potentia  operativa  est  operatic. 
In  angelo  autem  non  est  idem  intelligere  et  esse  ;  nee  aliqua  alia  operatic,  aut  in 
ipso  aut  in  quocunquc  alio  create,  est  idem  quod  ejus  esse.     Unde  essentia  angeli 
non  est  ejus  potentia  intellectiva,  nee  alicujus  creati  essentia  est   ejus  operativa 
potentia."— ibid.,  q.  54,  art  3. 


302  ONTOLOGY 

finite  substance  as  such  cannot  be  immediately  operative  ?  Even 
were  it  immediately  operative  its  actions  would  still  be  accidents, 
and  the  distinction  between  Creator  and  creature  would  stand  un- 
touched. The  operative  power  must  be  an  accident  because  the 
action  which  actualizes  it,  the  "  actus  secundus^  is  an  accident. 
But  the  consequentia  has  not  been  proved,  and  it  is  not  self-evident. 
On  the  theory  of  the  real  distinction,  is  not  the  operative  power  itself 
an  actual  perfection  of  the  substance,  and  therefore  in  some  sort  an 
actualization  of  the  latter?  And  yet  they  are  not  in  the  same 
ultimate  category,  in  eodem  genere  supremo.  The  nature  which  is 
the  potential  subject,  perfected  by  the  operative  power,  is  a  sub- 
stance, while  the  operative  power  which  perfects  the  substance  by 
actualizing  this  potentiality  is  an  accident.  Of  course  there  is 
not  exactly  the  same  correlation  between  substance  and  operative 
power  as  between  the  latter  and  action.  But  anyhow  the  action 
is  in  some  true  sense  an  actualization  of  the  substance,  at  least 
through  the  medium  of  the  power,  unless  we  are  prepared  to  break 
up  the  concrete  unity  of  the  agent  by  referring  the  action  solely 
to  the  power  of  the  agent,  and  isolating  the  substance  of  the 
latter  as  a  sort  of  immutable  core  which  merely  "  exists  "  :  a  mode 
of  conceiving  the  matter,  which  looks  very  like  the  mistake  of 
reifying  abstract  concepts.  And  if  the  action  is  in  any  true  sense 
an  actualization  of  the  substance,  we  have,  after  all,  a  potentia  and 
actus  which  are  not  in  the  same  ultimate  category. 

These  considerations  carry  us,  of  course,  right  into  what  is  perhaps  the 
most  fundamental  of  all  metaphysical  problems  :  that  of  the  mode  in  which 
finite  reality  is  actual.  In  its  concrete  actuality  every  finite  real  being  is  es- 
sentially subject  to  change  :  its  actuality  is  not  tota  simul :  at  every  instant 
it  not  only  is  but  is  becoming :  it  is  a  mixture  of  potentiality  and  actuality  :  it  is 
ever  really  changing,  and  yet  the  "  it  "  which  changes  can  in  some  real  degree 
and  for  some  real  space  of  time  persist  or  endure  identical  with  itself  as  a 
"  subsisting  thing  "  or  "  person  ".  How,  then,  are  we  to  conceive  aright  the 
mode  of  its  actuality  ?  Take  the  concrete  existing  being  at  any  instant  of  its 
actuality  :  suppose  that  it  is  not  merely  undergoing  change  through  the  influence 
of  other  beings  in  its  environment,  or  through  its  own  immanent  action,  but 
that  it  is  itself*'  acting,"  whether  immanently  or  transitively.  If  we  consider  that 
at  this  instant  its  existence  is  "  really  distinct  "  from  its  actionvtt  cannot  mean 
by  this  that  there  is  in  it  an  unchanging  substantial  core,  which  is  actually  merely 
"existing,"  and  a  vesture  of  active  and  passive  accidental  principles,  which  is 
just  now  actual  (though  always  in  a  state  of  flux  or  change)  by  "  acting  "  or 
"  being  acted  on  ".*  Such  a  conception  would  conflict  with  the  truth  that  the 

1  As  we  shall  see  later,  action  as  such  does  not  perfect  or  change  the  agens,  un- 
less when,  as  in  immanent  action,  the  agens  is  identical  with  the  patiens.  Action 
formally  actualizes  or  perfects  the  patiens  :  aciio  Jit  in  passo.  But  the  exercise  of 


SOME  ACCIDENT  MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY       303 


existing  substance  is  ever  being  really  and  actually,  though  accidentally, 
determined,  changed,  modified,  improved  or  disimproved,  in  its  total  concrete 
existing  reality.  Even  when  these  changes  are  not  so  profound  as  to  destroy 
its  substantial  identity  and  thus  terminate  its  actuality  as  an  individual  being, 
even  when,  in  other  words,  they  are  not  substantial,  they  are  none  the  less  real 
and  really  affect  the  substance.  Since  they  are  real  they  necessarily  involve 
the  recognition  of  really  distinct  principles  in  the  concrete  being  and  preclude 
the  view  that  the  distinctions  which  we  recognize  in  the  ever-changing  modes 
of  its  actuality,  as  revealed  to  us  in  time  and  space,  are  all  merely  conceptual  or 
logical  distinctions  projected  by  the  mind  into  what  would  therefore  be  in  fact 
a  simple  and  immutable  reality.  The  denial  of  any  real  distinction  between 
successive  actual  states,  or  between  co-existing  principles  of  those  states,  in  any 
finite  being,  would  lead  logically  to  the  Eleatic  doctrine,  i.e.  to  denial  of  the 
reality  of  change.  On  the  other  hand,  while  recognizing  that  change  is  a  reality 
and  not  a  subjective  mental  illusion,  and  that  real  change  can  be  grounded 
only  in  a  plurality  of  really  distinct  principles  in  the  finite  individual  being,  we 
must  at  the  same  time  hold  that  this  plurality  of  really  distinct  principles  in  the 
individual  does  not  destroy  a  real  unity,  stability,  and  self-identical  continuity 
of  the  individual  being  in  the  mode  of  its  actuality  throughout  time.  Not,  of 
course,  that  this  stability  or  sameness  of  the  individual  throughout  time  is  com- 
plete and  adequate  to  the  exclusion  of  all  real  change,  but  it  is  certainly  a  real 
continuity  of  one  and  the  same  individual  being :  to  deny  this  would  be  to  re- 
move all  permanence  from  reality  and  to  reduce  all  real  being  to  flux  or 
change,  i.e.  to  the  iravra  pei  of  the  Ionian  philosopher,  Heraclitus. 

We  cannot  get  a  true  conception  of  any  finite  reality  by  considering  it 
merely  from  the  static  point  of  view,  which  is  the  natural  standpoint  of 
abstract  thought ;  we  must  view  it  also  from  the  dynamic-kinetic  standpoint, 
i.e.  not  merely  as  an  essence  or  principle  of  existence,  but  as  a  power  or  prin- 
ciple of  action,  and  of  consequent  change,  evolution,  or  decay.  And  the 
philosophy  which  is  the  latest  fashion  among  contemporary  systems,  that  of  the 
brilliant  French  thinker  and  writer,  Bergson,  has  at  all  events  the  merit  of  em- 
phasizing this  important  truth,  that  if  our  philosophical  analysis  of  experience 
is  to  be  fruitful  we  must  try  to  grasp  reality  not  merely  as  it  presents  itself  to 
abstract  thought  at  any  section  drawn  by  the  latter  through  the  incessant 
process  of  its  fieri  or  continuous  actualization  in  time,  but  also  to  grasp  and 
analyse  as  far  as  possible  the  fieri  or  process  itself,  and  bring  to  light  what- 
ever we  find  that  this  process  implies. 

any  activity  by  an  agent  undoubtedly  connotes  or  implies  a  perfection  of  this  agent. 
It  is  not,  however,  that  the  actual  operation  as  such  (unless  it  is  immanent)  adds  a 
new  perfection  to  the  agent.  Rather  the  agent's  power  of  acting,  revealed  to  us  in 
its  exercise,  is  for  us  a  measure  of  the  actual  perfection  of  the  agent.  But  the 
question  remains  :  Is  this  power  or  perfection,  so  far  as  we  know  it,  a.  substantial 
perfection  ?  Is  it  the  very  perfection  itself  of  the  agent's  substance  or  nature  as  known 
to  us  ?  Or  is  it  an  accidental  perfection  which  is  for  us  an  index  of  a  corresponding 
degree  of  substantial  perfection  ?  In  getting  our  knowledge  of  the  nature  of  a  sub- 
stance from  a  consideration  of  its  sensible  accidents,  its  phenomena,  its  operations — 
according  to  the  rule,  Operari  sequitur  esse  :  qualis  est  operatio  tails  est  natura — 
can  we  use  a  single  inference,  from  action  to  nature,  or  must  we  use  a  double  infer- 
ence, from  action  to  power,  and  from  power  to  nature  ?  But  even  if  we  have  to 
make  the  double  inference,  this  of  itself  does  not  prove  any  more  than  a  conceptual 
distinction  between  power  and  nature. 


304  ONTOLOGY 

These  considerations  may  help  the  student  to  estimate  for  himself  the 
value  and  the  limitations  of  the  argument  which  has  suggested  them. 

(U)  A  thing  cannot  be  really  identical  with  a  variety  of  things 
that  are  really  distinct  from  one  another;  but  the  faculties  of  the 
soul  are  really  distinct  from  one  another ;  therefore  they  must  be 
really  distinct  from  the  substance  of  the  soul.  The  minor  pre- 
miss is  supported  by  these  considerations :  The  vegetative  and 
sentient  operations  of  the  human  individual  are  operations  of  the 
living  organism,  while  the  higher  operations  of  rational  thought 
and  volition  are  operations  of  the  soul  alone,  the  spiritual  or  im- 
material principle  in  the  individual.  But  the  immaterial  principle 
cannot  be  really  and  adequately  identical  with  the  animated  organ- 
ism. Therefore  the  powers  or  immediate  principles  of  these  two 
classes  of  functions,  belonging  as  they  do  to  two  really  (though 
not  adequately)  distinct  substantial  principles,  cannot  be  really 
identical  with  one  of  them,  viz.  with  the  soul  itself,  the  spiritual 
principle.  Again :  The  exercise  of  certain  functions  by  the 
human  individual  is  subordinate  to,  and  dependent  on  the  previous 
exercise  of  other  functions.  For  example,  actual  volition  is 
necessarily  dependent  and  consequent  on  actual  thought :  we 
cannot  will  or  desire  any  good  without  first  knowing  it  as  a  good. 
But  the  immediate  principle  of  any  function  or  activity  cannot  be 
dependent  on  or  subordinate  to  itself.  Therefore  the  immediate 
principles  of  such  controlling  and  controlled  activities — intellect 
and  will,  for  example — must  be  really  distinct  faculties.1 

(c)  Suppose  the  substance  or  nature  of  an  agent — the  human 
individual,  for  instance — were  really  identical  with  all  its  powers 
or  faculties,  that  these  were  merely  the  nature  itself  viewed  under 
different  aspects,  so  that  there  would  be  in  reality  only  one  operative 
power  in  the  individual,  then  there  would  be  no  reason  why  the 
individual  could  not  or  should  not  at  any  instant  elicit  one  single 
action  or  operation  which  would  be  simultaneously  an  act  of 
thinking,  willing,  seeing,  hearing,  etc.,  i.e.  which  would  have  at 
once  in  itself  the  modalities  of  all  human  activities.  But  universal 
experience  testifies,  on  the  contrary,  that  the  operations  of  the 
individual  are  each  of  some  particular  mode  only,  that  he  cannot 
elicit  every  mode  of  human  activity  simultaneously,  that  he  never 
elicits  one  single  act  having  a  variety  of  modes.  But  why  could  he 
not,  if  his  substance  or  nature  itself  were  the  one  and  only/rari- 

JC/.  ST.  THOMAS,  Q.  Disp.  de.  spir.  creai.,  art.  n,  in  C.— MAHER,  Psychology 
ch.  iii. 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY       305 

mate  principle  of  all  his  modes  of  activity?  Because  the  condi- 
tions for  the/z*//  and  adequate  exercise  of  this  one  single  or  proxi- 
mate principle  (at  once  substance  and  power)  are  never  realized  ! 
But  it  is  arbitrary  to  assume  the  existence  of  a  power  which  could 
never  pass  fully  into  the  act  connatural  to  it.  And  moreover, 
even  if  these  conditions  are  partially  realized  we  should  see  as  a 
consequence  of  this  some  human  activity  which  would  manifest 
in  some  degree  at  least  all  the  modalities  of  the  various  human 
actions  of  which  we  have  experience.  But  we  have  no  experience 
of  a  single  human  activity  manifesting  in  any  degree  the  modalities 
of  the  numerous  and  really  distinct  human  activities  which  ex- 
perience reveals  to  us.  Hence  the  variety  of  these  really  distinct 
modes  of  activity  can  be  explained  only  by  the  fact  that  the 
human  individual  elicits  them  through  proximate  operative  prin- 
ciples or  powers  which  are  really  distinct  from  one  another  and 
from  the  nature  itself  of  the  individual.  * 

The  problem  of  analysing  and  classifying  the  forces,  faculties,  or  powers 
of  the  subsisting  things  and  persons  in  the  universe  of  our  experience,  belongs 
partly  to  Cosmology  and  partly  to  Psychology.  In  the  latter  it  becomes 
mainly  a  problem  of  classifying  our  mental  acts,  functions,  or  processes — 
our  states  of  consciousness.  Apart  from  the  question  whether  or  not  our  men- 
tal faculties  are  really  distinct  from  one  another  and  from  the  human  nature 
or  substance  itself  of  the  individual,  the  problem  of  their  proper  classification 
is  important  from  the  point  of  view  of  method and  of  accurate  psychological 
analysis.  We  have  seen  already  (69)  that  the  greatest  scholastic  philoso- 
phers are  not  unanimous  in  declaring  the  distinction  to  be  real.  But  it  is  at 
least  a  virtual  distinction  ;  and  even  as  such  it  gives  rise  to  the  problem  of 
classification.  It  will  be  sufficient  here  to  indicate  the  general  principle  on 
which  the  classification  proceeds  :  Wherever  the  acts  are  adequately  dis- 
tinct they  proceed  from  distinct  powers  ;  and  the  acts  are  adequately  distinct 
when  they  have  adequately  distinct  formal  objects?  Potentiae  specificantur 
per  actus  et  objecta.  The  operation  or  act  is  the  correlative  of  the  power  or 
faculty  ;  and  the  formal  object  or  term  of  the  operation  is  the  final  cause  of 
the  latter,  the  end  for  which  it  is  elicited.  On  this  basis  Aristotle  and  the 
scholastics  distinguish  two  mental  faculties  of  the  higher  or  spiritual  order, 
intellect  and  will ;  and  in  the  lower  or  sense  order  of  mental  life  they  distin- 
guish one  appetitive  faculty,  sense  appetite,  and  several  cognitive  sense 
faculties.  These  latter  comprise  the  internal  sense  faculties,  viz.  the  sensus 
communis  or  unifying  and  associating  sense,  the  imagination,  sense  memory, 
and  instinct ;  and  the  external  sense  faculties  comprise  sight,  sound,  taste, 
smell  and  touch. 

81.  SOME  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  QUALITIES.—  (d)   Qualities 

1  Cf.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  §  168. 

2C/.  ibid.,  op,  cit.,  §  169;  MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  iii.  (p.  29,  n.  3.) 

20 


3o6  ONTOLOGY 

have  contraries.  Health  and  illness,  virtue  and  vice,  science  and 
error,  etc.,  are  opposed  as  contraries.  This,  however,  is  not  a  pro- 
perty of  qualities ;  it  is  not  verified  in  powers,  or  in  forms  and 
figures  ;  and  it  is  verified  in  accidents  which  are  not  qualities, 
e.g.  in  actio  andflassw. 

(£)  Quality  is  the  basis  or  "fundamentum  "  of  all  relations  of 
similarity  and  dissimilarity.  This  attribute  seems  to  be  in  the 
strict  sense  a  property  of  all  qualities.  Substances  are  similar  in 
so  far  as  they  have  the  same  kind  of  qualities,  dissimilar  in  so 
far  as  they  have  different  kinds.  Similarity  of  substances  is  the 
main  index  to  identity  of  nature  or  kind ;  but  it  must  not  be  con- 
founded with  the  latter.  The  latter  cannot  always  be  inferred 
even  from  a  high  degree  of  similarity :  some  specifically  distinct 
classes  of  things  are  very  similar  to  one  another.  Nor,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  full  and  complete  similarity  a  necessary  consequence 
of  identity  of  nature :  individuals  of  the  same  species  are  often 
very  dissimilar,  very  unlike  one  another. 

(c]  Qualities  admit  of  varying  degrees  of  intensity.  They  can 
increase  or  diminish  in  the  same  substance,  while  numerically 
(and  specifically)  distinct  substances  can  have  the  same  kind  of 
quality  in  different  degrees.  This  is  manifest  in  regard  to 
"habits,"  "passions"  and  " sensible  qualities".  On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  clearly  not  true  of  "  form  "  or  "  figure ".  Different 
individuals  can  have  the  same  kind  of  "  natural  power  "  in  dif- 
ferent degrees.  One  man  may  be  naturally  of  keener  intellect 
and  stronger  will  than  another:  the  weak  power  was  what 
Aristotle  called  aSwajjuia  (impotentid].  But  whether  the 
natural  powers  of  the  same  individual  can  themselves  increase  or 
decrease  in  strength  or  intensity — and  not  merely  the  habits  that 
affect  these  powers — is  not  so  clear.  Operative  powers  are 
certainly  perfected  (or  injured)  by  the  acquisition  of  good  (or  bad) 
habits.  In  the  view  of  those  who  deny  a  real  distinction  between 
natural  operative  power  or  faculty  and  substance,  it  is,  of  course, 
the  substance  itself  that  is  so  perfected  (or  injured). 

This  attribute,  therefore,  is  not  found  in  all  qualities  ;  but  it  is 
found  in  qualities  aloney  and  not  in  any  other  category  or  mode 
of  being. 

How  are  we  to  conceive  this  variation  in  intensity,  this 
growth  or  diminution  of  any  quality,  in  a  substance  in  which 
such  change  takes  places?  On  this  point  philosophers  are  not 
agreed.  By  "  degree  of  intensity  " — "  intensio  vel  remissio  quali- 


SOME  ACCIDENT-MODES  OF  BEING:  QUALITY       307 


tatis  " — we  understand  the  degree  (or  change  of  degree)  in  which 
the  same  numerical  quality  affects  the  same  part  or  the  same 
power  of  its  subject,  thus  rendering  this  part  or  power  formally 
more  or  less  "  qualified"  in  some  particular  way.  This  is  clearly 
something  quite  different  from  the  extension  of  the  same  quality 
to  different  parts  (or  its  withdrawal  from  different  parts)  of  the 
same  extended  subject.  In  a  corporeal,  extended  substance, 
there  can  accordingly  be  question  of  both  kinds  of  change,  inten- 
sive and  extensive ;  while  in  a  simple,  spiritual  substance  there 
can  obviously  be  question  only  of  intensive  change  of  qualities. 
And  the  fact  of  intensive  change  of  qualities  is  an  undeniable  fact 
of  experience.  In  what  manner  does  it  take  place?  Some 
authors  conceive  it  as  an  addition  or  subtraction  of  grades  or  degrees 
of  the  same  quality.  Others,  conceiving  qualities  as  simple, 
indivisible  entities  or  "forms,"  and  thence  denying  the  possibil- 
ity of  distinct  grades  of  any  quality,  conceive  such  change  to  take 
place  by  this  simple  entity  affecting  its  subject  more  or  less  in- 
timately, becoming  more  or  less  firmly  rooted,  as  it  were,  in  its 
subject.1  And  they  explain  this  more  or  less  perfect  mode  of 
inherence  in  a  variety  of  ways,  all  of  which  are  grounded  on  cer- 
tain texts  of  St.  Thomas : 2  the  quality  receives  a  new  accidental 
mode  whereby  it  "  communicates  itself  to  "  the  subject,  and  "  in- 
forms "  the  latter,  more  or  less  perfectly ;  or,  it  is  educed  more 
or  less  fully  from  the  potentiality  of  its  subject,  thus  qualifying 
the  latter  in  the  degree  in  which  it  is  educed  from,  and  rooted  in, 
the  latter. 

These  explanations  are  instructive,  as  illustrating  the  view  that  the  actual 
reality  of  the  accidental  mode  of  being  consists  in  its  affecting,  determining, 
the  subject  in  which  it  inheres.  St.  Thomas,  professing  that  he  can  attach 

1  Of  course  all  accidents  are  "  forms  "  in  the  sense  of  being  determining  princi- 
ples of  their  subjects,  these  being  considered  as  determinable  or  receptive  principles. 
Even  quantity  is  a  form  in  this  sense.     But  quantity  itself  does  not  appear  to  be  a 
"  simple  "  principle  in  the  sense  of  being  "  indivisible  "  :  its  very  function  is  to  make 
the  corporeal  substance  divisible  into  integral  parts.     What  then  of  all  those  qualities 
which  inhere  immediately  in  the  quantity  of  corporeal  substances  ?     They  are  deter- 
minations or  affections  of  a  composite,  extended,  divisible  subject.      Conceived  in 
the  abstract  they  have,  of  course,  the  attributes  of  indivisibility,  immutability,  etc., 
characteristic  of  all  abstract  essences  (14).    But  in  their  physical  actuality  in  what  in- 
telligible sense  can  they  be  said  to  be  simple,  indivisible  entities  ? 

2  Summa  Theol.,  i»,  iiae,  q.  52,  art.  2;  iia,  iiae,  q.  24,  art.  4,  5. — Q.  Disp.  de 
Virtutibus  in  communi,  q.  i,  art.  n,  in  c. — I.  In  Sentent.,  Dist.,  17,  q.  2,  art.  2. — Cf. 
URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §§  329-332,  for  arguments  and  authorities.     The  author  himself 
defends  the  former  view,  according  to  which  alteration  takes  place  by  a  real  addition 
or  substraction  of  grades  of  the  same  quality. 

20* 


308  ONTOLOGY 

no  intelligible  meaning  to  addition  or  substraction  of  grades,*  teaches  that 
the  habit  of  charity,  for  example,  can  be  increased  "  secundum  essentiam  "  by 
"inhering  more  perfectly,"  "  being  more  firmly  rooted  "  in  its  subject ;  for,  he 
says,  since  it  is  an  accident,  "  ejus  esse  est  inesse.  Unde  nihil  est  aliud  ip- 
sam  secundum  essentiam  augeri,  quam  earn  magis  inesse  subjecto,  quod  est 
magis  earn  radicari  in  subjecto.  Augetur  ergo  essentialiter  .  .  .  ita  quod 
magis  ac  magis  in  subjecto  esse  incipiat."  2  And  elsewhere  he  concludes  with 
the  words  :  "  Ponere  igitur  quod  aliqua  qualitas  non  augeatur  secundum 
essentiam,  sed  augeatur  secundum  radicationem  in  subjecto  vel  secundum 
intensionem  actus,  est  ponere  contradictoria  esse  simul  ".3 

1 1.  In  Sentent.,  Dist.,  17,  q.  2,  art.  2.  2  iia,  iiae,  q.  24,  art.  4,  ad.  3. 

3Q.  Disp.  de  Virtut.,  q.  i,  art.  ri,  in  c. 


CHAPTER  XL 

QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME. 

82.  ANALYSIS  OF  THE  CONCEPT  OF  QUANTITY. — A  detailed 
study  of  Quantity,  including  Space  and  Time,  and  the  Aristo- 
telian categories  Ubi>  Quando  and  Situs,  belongs  to  Cosmology. 
Here  we  shall  confine  ourselves  mainly  to  the  exposition  of 
certain  elementary  notions  preparatory  to  such  detailed  study ; 
and  we  shall  assume  the  validity  of  the  Scholastic  Theory  of 
Knowledge :  that  a  real,  material  world  exists  independently  of 
our  minds ;  that  it  consists  of  material  substances  or  bodies, 
animate  and  inanimate,  endowed  with  the  fundamental  accident 
of  quantity  or  extension ;  that  these  bodies  possess,  moreover, 
many  other  real  accidents  such  as  qualities  and  energies,  chemical, 
physical  and  mechanical ;  that  they  are  subject  to  real  change, 
local,  quantitative,  qualitative  and  substantial ;  that  our  concepts 
of  space  and  time,  derived  from  those  of  extension  and  change, 
are  not  purely  subjective  or  mental  forms  of  cognition,  but  are 
objectively  valid  notions  grounded  in  the  realitycof  the  corporeal 
universe  and  giving  us  a  genuine,  if  inadequate,  insight  into  the 
nature  of  this  reality. 

Among  the  characteristics  recognized  by  physicists  in  all 
perceptible  matter — divisibility,  commensurability,  impenetra- 
bility, passivity  or  inertia,  subjection  to  external  forces  or 
energies,  external  extension  or  volume,  internal  quantity  or 
mass — there  are  none  more  fundamental  than  those  of  volume 
and  mass,  or  extension  and  quantity.1  Nowhere,  however,  do  we 
find  a  better  illustration  of  the  fact  that  it  is  impossible  to  give  a 
definition  proper  of  any  supreme  category,  or  even  a  description 
of  it  by  the  aid  of  any  more  elementary  notions,  than  in  the 
attempts  of  philosophers  to  describe  Quantity.  When,  for  in- 

1The  scientific  concept  of  "volume"  is  identical  with  the  common  and 
philosophical  concept  of  "  external,  actual,  local,  or  spatial  extension ".  The 
functions  ascribed  by  physics  and  mechanics  to  the  "  mass  "  of  a  body  have  no  other 
source,  in  the  body,  than  what  philosophers  understand  by  the  "  internal  extension  " 
or  "quantity"  of  the  body. — Cf.  NYS,  Cosmologie  (Louvain,  1903),  §§  192-203. 

309 


310  ONTOLOGY 

stance,  we  describe  external,  actual,  local,  or  spatial  extension  as 
that  accident  of  a  corporeal  substance  or  body  in  virtue  of  which  the 
latter  so  exists  that  it  has  parts  outside  parts  in  space,  we  have  to 
admit  at  once  that  the  notions  expressed  by  the  terms  "  parts," 
"outside"  and  "space"  are  no  simpler  than  the  notion  of  ex- 
tension itself:  in  fact  our  notions  of  "place"  (locus)  and  "space" 
(spatium)  are  derived  from,  and  presuppose,  that  of  extension. 
This,  however,  is  no  serious  disadvantage ;  for  the  description, 
such  as  it  is,  indicates  what  we  mean  by  the  terms  "local, 
spatial,  external,  actual  extension,"  and  declares  this  latter  to  be 
an  accident  of  corporeal  substances. 

Extension,  as  it  is  actually  in  the  concrete  body,  affected  by 
a  variety  of  sensible  qualities,  is  called  physical  extension ;  re- 
garded in  the  abstract,  apart  from  these  qualities,  it  is  called 
geometrical  or  mathematical  extension  :  trina  dimensio,  or  ex- 
tension in  three  dimensions,  length,  breadth  and  depth.  If 
we  abstract  from  one  of  these  we  have  extension  in  two  dimen- 
sions, superficial  extension ;  if  we  abstract  from  two,  we  have 
extension  in  one  dimension,  linear  extension  ;  and  if  we  abstract 
from  all  three  we  have  the  extreme  limiting  concept  of  the  mathe- 
matical point.  Of  these  four  abstract  mathematical  concepts, 
"point,"  "line,"  "surface,"  and  "volume,"  each  expresses  the 
mathematical  limitation  of  the  succeeding  one. 

We  cannot  conceive  a  body  existing  by  having  parts  outside 
parts  in  space,  each  part  occupying  exclusively  a  place  ap- 
propriated to  itself,  unless  we  conceive  the  body,  the  corporeal 
substance,  as  having  already  a  plurality  of  really  distinct  or  dis- 
tinguishable parts  in  itself,  and  abstracting  from  all  relation  to 
space.  The  substance  must  be  conceived  as  having  a  plurality 
of  really  distinct  or  distinguishable  integral  parts  of  itself,  before 
these  parts  can  be  conceived  as  existing  outside  one  another, 
each  in  its  own  place.  And  the  property  in  virtue  of  which  the 
corporeal  substance  has  in  itself  this  plurality  of  distinct  integral 
parts,  whereby  it  is  capable  of  occupying  space,  and  of  being  im- 
penetrable, divisible,  measurable,  etc.,  is  called  internal,  radical, 
potential  quantity  or  extension.^ 

The  corporeal  substance  itself  is,  of  course,  essentially  com- 
posite, essentially  divisible  into  two  essential  constitutive  principles, 

1  The  terms  quantity  and  extension  are  commonly  taken  as  synonymous ;  but 
quantity  is  more  properly  applied  to  the  internal  plurality  of  integral  parts  of  the 
substance  itself,  extension  to  the  dispersion  of  these  parts  outside  one  another  in 
space. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  311 

the  passive,  determinable,  or  material  principle  (materia  prima\ 
and  the  specifying,  determining,  formative  principle  (forma  sub- 
stantialis].  Then  we  conceive  this  essentially  composite  sub- 
stance as  necessarily  endowed  with  the  property  of  internal 
quantity  whereby  it  is  composite  in  another  order :  composed  of, 
and  divisible  into,  really  distinct  integral  parts,  each  of  which  is, 
of  course,  essentially  composite  like  the  whole  itself.1  Finally 
we  conceive  that  the  corporeal  substance,  endowed  with  this 
property,  has  also,  as  a  connatural  but  really  distinct  and 
absolutely  separable  effect  of  the  latter,  the  accidental  mode  of 
being,  called  external  or  local  extension,  in  virtue  of  which  it 
actually  occupies  space,  and  thus  becomes  the  subject  of  all 
those  qualities  whereby  it  is  perceptible  to  our  senses. 

We  have  next  to  inquire  into  the  relations  between  these 
three  distinct  objective  concepts,  corporeal  substance,  internal 
quantity,  and  local  or  external  extension. 

83.  CORPOREAL  SUBSTANCE,  QUANTITY  AND  EXTENSION. — 
The  corporeal  substance  is  an  essentially  composite  substance, 
resulting  from  the  union  of  two  distinct  essential  constitutive 
principles.  It  exists  in  itself  and  is  the  ultimate  subject  of  all 
the  determinations  whereby  it  reveals  itself  to  our  senses.  Its 
actual  extension  in  space  is  a  fundamental  mode  or  determina- 
tion of  its  reality,  but  it  is  a  mode  which  is  distinct  from  the 
reality  itself  of  the  corporeal  substance.  Aristotle  regarded  the 
distinction  as  real.  In  his  Metaphysics  he  declares  that  the 
three  dimensions  of  bodies  are  quantities,  not  substances,  that 
quantity  is  not  a  substance,  whereas  that  in  which  it  ultimately 
inheres  is  a  substance ; 2  in  his  Physics  he  says  that  substance  is 
of  itself  indivisible  and  is  made  divisible  by  its  quantity  or  ex- 
tension ; 3  in  his  De  Anima^  he  observes  that  [external]  quantity 
is  directly  perceptible  by  the  senses  (sensibile  per  se)  while  sub- 
stance is  only  indirectly  perceptible  (sensibile  per  accidens) : 5 
from  which  it  is  inferred  that  substance  and  extension  cannot  be 
really  identical.  Again,  St.  Thomas  argues  that  a  corporeal 

1  Hence  Aristotle's  definition  in  Metaph.,  iv.  :  "  Quantum  dicitur,  quod  [est]  in 
insita  divisibile,  quorum  utrumque  aut  singula  unum  quid  eti  hoc  quid  apta  sunt 
esse  "  :  a  quantified  substance  is  one  which  is  divisible  into  parts  that  are  really 
in  it  [i.e.  partes  integrantes],  parts  each  of  which  is  capable  of  becoming  a  distinct 
subsisting  individual  thing. — Cf.  NYS,  Cosmologie,  §  154. 

"  Longitudo,  latitudo  et  profunditas  quantitates  quaedam,  sed  non  substantiae 
sunt.  Quantitas  enim  non  est  substantia,  sed  magis  cui  haec  ipsa  primo  insunt 
llud  est  substantia." — Metaph.,  L.  vii.,  ch.  iii. 

3  Physic,  L.  i.,  ch.  ii,  L,  ii.,  ch.  iv.  5  Cf.  §  62  supra. 


3i2  ONTOLOGY 

substance  as  such,  and  so  far  as  its  essence  is  concerned,  is 
indifferent  to  greater  or  less  extension  in  space,  that  the  whole 
nature  or  substance  of  a  man,  for  instance,  is  indifferent  to,  and 
independent  of,  his  particular  size  at  any  point  of  time,  that 
v  while  he  grows  from  childhood  to  manhood  it  is  his  external 

quantity  that  changes,  but  not  his  humanity,  his  human  essence, 
nature,  or  substance.1 

Considerations  such  as  these,  though  they  do  not  indeed 
amount  to  cogent  proofs  of  a  real  distinction  between  spatial 
extension  and  corporeal  substance,  should  make  any  serious 
philosopher  hesitate  to  identify  these  absolutely,  as  Descartes  and 
his  followers  did  when  they  declared  the  essence  of  corporeal 
substance  to  consist  in  three  dimensions  of  spatial  extension. 
Even  looking  at  the  matter  from  the  point  of  view  of  natural 
reason  alone,  and  apart  altogether  from  any  light  that  may  be 
thrown  upon  it  for  the  Christian  philosopher  by  Divine  Revela- 
tion, it  is  only  the  superficial  thinker  who  will  conclude  that 
because  extension — which  reveals  to  his  intellect  through  the 
medium  of  external  sense  perception  the  presence  of  a  corporeal 
substance — is  naturally  inseparable  from  the  latter,  therefore  it 
is  really  and  absolutely  identical  with  this  latter.  The  philosopher 
who  remembers  how  little  is  known  for  certain  about  the 
ultimate,  essential  constitution  of  bodies  or  corporeal  substances, 
will  be  slow  to  conclude  that  the  spatially  extended  mode  of 
their  being  enters  into  the  constitution  of  their  essence,  and  is 
not  rather  an  accidental  determination  whereby  these  substances 
have  their  integral  parts  dispersed  or  extended  in  space  and  thus 
revealed  to  the  human  intellect  through  sense  perception. 

And  if  he  be  a  Christian  philosopher  he  will  naturally  inquire  whether 
any  truth  of  the  Christian  Revelation  will  help  indirectly  to  determine  the 
question.  Descartes  and  his  followers  were  Christian  philosophers ;  and 
hence  it  was  all  the  more  rash  and  imprudent  of  them,  in  spite  of  what  they 
knew  concerning  the  Blessed  Eucharist,  to  identify  the  corporeal  substance 
with  its  spatial  extension.  They  knew  that  by  transubstantiation  the  bread 
and  wine  are  changed  substantially  into  the  Body  and  Blood  of  Christ.  But 
all  the  appearances  or  phenomena  of  bread  and  wine  remain  after  transub- 
stantiation, the  Eucharistic  species  as  they  are  called,  the  taste,  colour,  form, 
etc.,  in  a  word,  all  the  sensible  qualities  of  these  substances,  including  the 
extension  in  which  they  immediately  inhere.  From  the  revealed  truth  that 
the  substances  disappear,  and  from  the  manifest  fact  that  all  their  accidents 

1  "  Propria  .  .  .  totalitas  substantiae  continetur  indifferenter  in  parva  vel  magna 
quantitate;  sicut  .  .  .  tola  natura  hominis  in  magno,  vel  parvo  homine." — Summa 
Theol.,  iii.,  q.  76,  art.  i,  ad.  3. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  313 

remain,  Christian  philosophers  and  theologians  have  rightly  drawn  the 
sufficiently  obvious  inference  that  the  spatially  extended  quantity,  which 
immediately  supports  all  the  other  sensible  qualities,  must  be  itself  an  absolute 
accident  not  only  really  distinct,  but  by  the  absolute  power  of  God  really 
separable,  from  its  connatural  substance,  the  bread  and  the  wine  respectively  ; 
and  that  this  extended  quantity  remains  in  this  state  of  actual  separation 
miraculously  supported  by  the  direct  influence  of  the  Divine  Omnipotence. 
And  while  Christian  philosophers  who  hold  this  view  can  defend  it  from  all 
charges  of  inconsistency,  unreasonableness  and  impossibility,  Descartes  and 
his  followers  can  defend  their  particular  view  only  by  the  admission  that  in 
the  case  of  the  consecrated  Eucharist  our  senses  are  deceived.  In  this  view, 
while  no  accidents  of  the  bread  and  wine  remain  objectively,  God  Himself 
produces  directly  in  our  minds  the  subjective,  mental  states  which  the  bread 
and  wine  produced  before  consecration.1  This  gratuitous  aspersion  is  cast 
on  the  trustworthiness  of  sense  perception,  simply  on  account  of  the  pre- 
conceived theory  identifying  the  corporeal  substance  with  its  extension. 
According  to  the  common  view,  on  the  other  hand,  the  senses  are  not  really 
deceived.  That  to  which  they  testify  is  really  there,  viz.  the  whole  collection 
of  natural  accidents  of  bread  and  wine.  It  is  not  the  function  of  the  senses, 
but  of  the  intellect,  to  testify  to  the  presence  of  the  substance.  Of  course 
the  unbeliever  looking  at  the  consecrated  species,  or  the  believer  who  looks 
at  them  not  knowing  that  they  have  been  consecrated,  thinks  that  the  sub- 
stance of  bread  and  the  substance  of  wine  are  there.  Each  is  deceived 
intellectually,  the  one  by  his  unbelief  of  a  truth,  the  other  by  his  ignorance  of 
a  fact.  If  both  knew  of  the  fact  of  consecration,  and  if  the  former  believed 
in  the  effect  of  it,  neither  would  be  deceived.'2 

While  the  Cartesian  view  is  thus  open  to  such  serious  objections,  the 
only  plausible  difficulty  against  the  traditional  view  is  that  of  conceiving  how 
the  reality  of  a  merely  accidental  mode  of  being,  such  as  extension,  can  be 
sustained  in  the  actual  order  of  things  apart  from  its  connatural  substance, 
and  yet  not  become  itself  eo  ipso  a  substance.  Needless  to  say  we  have  no 
positive  conception  of  the  manner  in  which  the  Divine  Omnipotence  thus 
sustains  extension  ;  but  since  this  latter,  being  an  absolute  accident,  and  not 
a  mere  modal  determination  of  the  substance,  has  a  reality  of  its  own,  the 
miraculous  persistence  of  this  reality  cannot  be  shown  to  be  impossible.  Nor 
is  it,  in  this  separated  condition,  itself  a  substance,  for  it  still  retains  its  natural 
aptitude  for  inherence  in  its  connatural  substance  ;  and  this  aptitude  alone, 
not  actual  inherence,  is  of  its  essence  as  an  accident  (65) :  retaining  this 
natural  aptitude  it  cannot  possibly  become  a  substance,  it  cannot  be  identi- 
fied with  the  substantial  mode  of  being  which  has  essentially  the  very 
opposite  aptitude,  that  of  existing  in  itself. 

1  No  argument  in  favour  of  this  view  can  be  based  on  the  use  of  the  term 
species  ("  manentibus  dunttaxat  speciebus  panis  et   vini  ")    by  the  Fathers   of  the 
Council  of  Trent.     For  them,  as  for  all  Catholic  philosophers  and  theologians  of 
the  time,  the  scholastic    term  species,  used  in  such  a  context,  meant   simply  the 
objective,  perceptible  accidents  of  the  substance.     Cf.  NYS,  op.  cit.,  §  175. 

2  Hence  the  significance  of  the  lines  in  ST.  THOMAS'  hymn,  Adoro  Te  devote : — 

Visus,  tactus,  gustus  in  te  fallitur, 
Sed  anditu  solo  tuto  creditur. 


3i4  ONTOLOGY 

External  extension,  then,  is  an  absolute  accident,  really 
distinct  from  the  corporeal  substance,  and  naturally  though  not 
absolutely  inseparable  from  the  latter.  It  is  the  natural  con- 
comitant or  consequence  of  the  internal  quantity  whereby  the 
corporeal  substance  has  in  itself  a  plurality  of  distinct  integral 
parts.  This  internal  quantity  itself  is  either  an  aspect  of  the 
corporeal  substance  itself,  only  virtually  distinct  from  the  latter, 
or  else  in  the  strict  sense  a  property,  absolutely  inseparable,  if 
really  distinct,  from  the  substance.  Natural  experience  furnishes 
no  example  of  a  corporeal  substance  actually  existing  devoid  of 
internal  quantity  or  internal  distinction  of  integral  parts.1  But 
scholastic  philosophers  are  not  agreed  as  to  whether  the  corporeal 
substance  is  itself  and  by  its  own  essence  a  manifold  of  really 
distinct  integral  parts  (in  which  case  internal  quantity  would  be 
merely  the  aspect  under  which  the  essence  is  thus  regarded  as 
an  integral  whole  constituted  by  a  plurality  of  distinct  integral 
parts ;  while,  looked  at  as  an  essence,  it  would  be  an  essential 
whole  constituted  by  the  union  of  two  essential  parts  or  prin- 
ciples)— or  whether  it  is  formally  constituted  an  integral  whole, 
not  by  its  essence  (which  makes  it  only  an  essential  whole,  an 
essentially  composite  substance),  but  by  a  property  really  distinct, 
though  necessarily  flowing,  from  this  essence,  viz.  internal 
quantity.  According  to  the  former  view  the  material  principle 
(materia  primd]  of  the  composite  corporeal  substance  is  such 
that  the  essence  resulting  from  its  union  with  the  formative 
principle  (forma  substantially)  is  necessarily  an  integral  whole 
with  distinguishable  integral  parts,  each  of  which  naturally  de- 
mands the  spatially  extended  mode  of  being  which  external 
extension  de  facto  confers  upon  it.  According  to  the  latter 
view,  which  is  that  of  St.  Thomas  and  his  followers  generally, 
the  corporeal  substance  as  such  has  no  mode  of  composition 
other  than  essential  composition :  it  is  not  of  itself  an  integral 
whole,  compounded  of  distinct  or  distinguishable  integral  parts 
(each  of  which  would  be,  like  the  whole,  essentially  composite) : 
\  of  itself  it  is  indivisible  into  integral  parts :  it  is,  therefore,  in 

1  and  neither  does  Revelation.  The  Body  of  our  Blessed  Lord  exists  in  the 
Eucharist  without  its  connatural  external  extension  and  consequent  impenetrability. 
But  according  to  the  common  teaching  of  Catholic  theologians  it  has  its  internal 
quantity,  its  distinct  integral  parts,  organs  and  members — really  distinct  from 
one  another,  though  interpenetrating  and  not  spatially  external  to  one  another.  Its 
mode  of  existence  in  the  space  occupied  by  the  sacramental  species  is  thus 
analogous  to  the  mode  in  which  the  soul  is  in  the  body,  or  a  pure  spirit  in  space. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  315 

this  order  of  being,  simple  and  not  composite.  It  has,  no  doubt, 
by  reason  of  its  material  principle,  an  absolutely  necessary 
exigence  for  divisibility  into  distinct  integral  parts,  for  integral 
composition  in  other  words.  But  this  actual  integral  composi- 
tion, this  actual  divisibility,  is  the  formal  effect  of  a  property 
really  distinct  from  the  substantial  essence  itself;  and  this 
property  is  internal  quantity :  the  connatural,  but  absolutely  , 
separable,  complement  of  this  internal  quantity  being,  as  in  the 
other  view,  local  or  spatial  extension. 

In  both  views  external  extension  is  an  absolute  accident  of 
the  corporeal  substance ;  and  in  the  Thomist  view  internal 
quantity  would  also  appear  to  be  an  absolute  accident,  and  not 
a  mere  mode. 

It  is  instructive  to  reflect  how  far  this  scholastic  doctrine  removes  us 
from  the  Cartesian  view  which  sets  up  an  absolute  antithesis  between  mind 
or  spirit,  and  matter  or  body,  placing  the  essence  of  the  former  in  thought 
and  that  of  the  latter  in  extension.  According  to  the  scholastic  view  the 
spiritual  substance  is  an  immaterial  "actuality"  or  "form"  ;  it  is  essentially 
simple,  and  not  like  a  corporeal  substance  an  essentially  composite  substance 
resulting  from  the  union  of  a  formative  principle  or  "  form  "  with  a  passive, 
determinable,  material  principle.  And  since  it  is  the  material  principle  that 
demands  the  property  of  internal  quantity  and  the  accident  of  external 
extension,  whereby  the  corporeal  substance  becomes  an  integral  whole  with  its 
parts  extended  in  space,  it  follows  that  the  spiritual  substance,  having  no 
material  principle  in  its  constitution,  is  not  only  essentially  simple — to  the 
exclusion  of  distinct  principles  of  its  essence, — but  is  also  and  as  a  conse- 
quence integrally  simple,  to  the  exclusion  of  distinct  integral  parts,  and  of  the 
extended  or  characteristically  corporeal  mode  of  occupying  space.  So  far 
there  is  contrast  between  the  two  great  substantial  modes  of  finite  being, 
matter  and  spirit ;  but  the  contrast  is  by  no  means  an  absolute  antithesis. 
For  if  we  look  at  the  essence  alone  of  the  corporeal  substance  it  is  not  of  itself 
actually  extended  in  space  :  in  the  Thomist  view  it  is  not  even  of  itself  divisible 
into  distinct  integral  parts.  It  differs  from  spirit  in  this  that  while  the  latter  is 
essentially  simple  the  former  is  essentially  composite  and  has  by  reason  of  this 
compositeness  a  natural  aptitude  for  divisibility  into  parts  and  for  the  exten- 
sion of  these  parts  in  space,  an  aptitude  which  spirit  does  not  possess.  But 
the  corporeal  substance  may  exist  without  actual  extension,  and  consequently 
without  any  of  those  other  attributes  such  as  impenetrability,  solidity,  colour, 
etc.,  through  which  it  is  perceptible  to  our  senses.  In  this  condition,  how 
does  it  differ  from  spirit  ?  In  being  essentially  composite,  and  in  being 
perhaps  endowed  with  distinguishable  integral  parts.1  But  in  this  condition  the 

1  We  know  from  Revelation  that  the  Body  of  our  Lord  exists  in  this  way  in  the 
Eucharist.  We  know,  too,  from  Revelation  that  after  the  general  resurrection  the 
glorified  bodies  of  the  just  will  be  veal  bodies,  real  corporeal  substances,  and  never- 
theless that  they  will  be  endowed  with  properties  very  different  from  those  which 
they  possess  in  the  present  state :  that  they  will  be  immortal,  incorruptible,  impas- 


3i6  ONTOLOGY 

essential  mode  of  its  being  has  a  relation  to  space  which  closely  resembles 
the  mode  in  which  spirit  exists  in  space  :  it  is  related  to  space  somewhat  in  the 
manner  in  which  the  soul  is  in  the  space  occupied  by  the  body — whole  in  the 
whole  of  this  space  and  whole  in  every  assignable  portion  of  this  space.  So 
that  after  all,  different  as  matter  and  spirit  undoubtedly  are,  the  difference 
between  them  is  by  no  means  that  sort  of  Cartesian  chasm  which  human 
thought  must  for  ever  fail  to  bridge. 

By  virtue  of  its  external  extension  thecorporeal  substance  exists 
by  having  distinguishable  parts  outside  parts  in  space.  We  can 
conceive  any  perceptible  volume  of  matter  as  being  perfectly 
continuous,  if  it  has  no  actual  limits  or  actual  distinction  of  parts 
within  itself,  but  is  one  individual  being  completely  filling  \\\Q  whole 
space  within  its  outer  surface ;  or  imperfectly  continuous,  if  while 
being  one  and  undivided  it  has  within  its  volume  pores  or  in- 
terstices, whether  these  be  empty  or  filled  with  some  other 
sort  of  matter ;  or  as  made  up  of  contiguous  integral  parts  if  each 
or  these  is  really  distinct  and  actually  divided  from  every  other, 
while  each  actually  touches  with  its  outer  limits  the  adjacent 
limits  of  the  parts  lying  next  to  it,  so  that  all  the  internal  parts 
or  limits  are  co-terminous ;  or  as  made  up  of  separate,  discrete  or 
distant  parts  no  one  of  which  actually  touches  any  other. 

It  is  clear  that  there  must  be,  in  any  actually  extended 
volume  of  matter,  ultimate  parts  which  are  really  continuous — 
unless  we  are  to  hold,  with  dynamists,  that  our  perception  of 
extension  is  produced  in  our  minds  by  the  action  of  extramental 
points  or  centres  of  force  which  are  themselves  simple  or  unex- 
tended.  But  the  physical  phenomena  of  contraction,  expansion, 
absorption,  undulatory  and  vibratory  motions  accompanying  our 
sensations  of  light,  heat  and  sound,  as  well  as  many  other  physical 
phenomena,  all  point  to  the  fact  that  volumes  of  matter  which 
are  apparently  continuous  are  really  porous :  the  molecular 
structure  of  perceptible  matter  is  an  accepted  physical  theory ; 
and  scientists  also  universally  accept  as  a  working  hypothesis  the 
existence  of  an  imperceptible  material  medium  pervading  and 
filling  all  real  space,  though  there  is  no  agreement  as  to  the  pro- 

sible,  "  spiritual  "  (cf.  i  Cor.  xv.).  The  Catholic  philosopher  who  adds  those 
scattered  rays  of  revealed  light  to  what  his  own  rational  analysis  of  experience  tells 
him  about  matter  and  spirit,  will  understand  the  possibility  of  such  a  kinship  be- 
tween the  latter  as  will  make  the  fact  of  their  union  in  his  own  nature  and  person  not 
perhaps  any  less  wonderful,  but  at  any  rate  a  little  less  surprising  and  inscrutable : 
and  this  without  committing  himself  to  the  objective  idealism  whereby  Berkeley, 
while  endeavouring  to  show  the  utter  unreality  of  matter,  only  succeeded  in  per- 
suading himself  that  its  reality  was  not  independent  of  all  mind. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  317 

perties  with  which  they  suppose  this  hypothetical  medium,  the 
"  ether,"  to  be  endowed. 

Again,  as  regards  the  divisibility  of  extended  matter,  it  is 
obvious  that  if  we  conceive  extension  in  three  dimensions 
geometrically,  mathematically  or  in  the  abstract,  any  such  volume 
or  extension  is  indefinitely  divisible  in  thought.  But  if  we  in- 
quire how  far  any  concrete,  actually  existing  volume  of  matter  is 
divisible,  we  know  in  the  first  place  that  we  cannot  divide  the 
body  of  any  actual  organic  living  thing  indefinitely  without  des- 
troying its  life,  and  so  its  specific  character.  Nor  can  we  carry 
on  the  division  of  inorganic  matter  indefinitely  for  want  of  suf- 
ficiently delicate  dividing  instruments.  But  apart  from  this  the 
science  of  chemistry  points  to  the  fact  that  every  inorganic  chemical 
compound  has  an  ultimate  individual  unit,  the  chemical  molecule, 
which  we  cannot  sub-divide  without  destroying  the  specific  nature 
of  the  compound  by  resolving  it  into  its  elements  or  into  less 
complex  compounds.  Furthermore,  each  "  elementary "  or 
"  chemically  simple  "  body — such  as  gold,  oxygen,  carbon,  etc. — 
seems  resolvable  into  units  called  "atoms,"  which  appear  to  be 
ultimate  individual  units  in  the  sense  that  if  their  mass  can  be 
subdivided  (as  appears  possible  from  researches  that  have  orig- 
inated in  the  discovery  of  radium)  the  subdivisions  are  speci- 
fically different  kinds  of  matter  from  that  of  the  atom  so  divided. 

In  the  inorganic  world  the  perceptible  mass  of  matter  is  cer- 
tainly not  an  individualizing,  a  unum  per  se,  but  only  a  collection 
of  individual  atoms  or  molecules,  a  unum  per  accidens.  Whether 
the  molecule  or  the  atom  of  the  chemically  elementary  body  is 
the  "individual,"  cannot  be  determined  with  any  degree  of  cer- 
titude. It  would  appear,  however,  that  every  specifically  distinct 
type  of  inorganic  matter,  whether  compound  or  elementary,  requires 
for  its  existence  a  certain  minimal  volume,  by  the  sub-division  of 
which  the  type  is  substantially  changed ;  and  this  is  manifestly 
true  of  organic  or  living  matter :  so  that  matter  as  it  naturally 
exists  would  appear  not  to  be  indefinitely  divisible. 

If  in  a  chemically  homogeneous  mass  of  inorganic  matter  (such  as  carbon 
or  water)  the  chemical  molecule  be  regarded  as  the  "  individual,"  this  cannot 
be  the  case  in  any  organic,  living  thing,  for  whatever  matter  is  assimilated 
into  the  living  substance  of  such  a  being  eo  ipso  undergoes  substantial  change 
whereby  it  loses  the  nature  it  had  and  becomes  a  constituent  of  the  living 
individual.  The  substantial,  "  individual "  unity  of  the  organic  living  being 
seems  to  be  compatible  not  merely  with  qualitative  (structural  and  functional) 
heterogeneity  of  parts,  but  also  with  (perhaps  even  complete")  spatial  separate- 


3i8  ONTOLOGY 

ness  of  these  parts.  If  the  structure  of  the  living  body  is  really  "  molecular," 
i.e.  if  it  has  distances  between  its  ultimate  integral  units,  so  that  these  are 
not  in  spatial  contact,  then  the  fact  that  the  formative,  vital  principle  (forma 
substantialis,  anima)  unifies  this  material  manifold,  and  constitutes  it  an 
"  individual  "  by  actualizing  and  vitalizing  each  and  all  of  the  material  units, 
spatially  separate  as  they  are,  —  this  fact  will  help  us  to  realize  that  the  forma- 
tive principle  of  the  composite  corporeal  substance  has  not  of  itself  the 
spatial^  extended  mode  of  being,  but  that  the  substance  derives  the  latter 
from  its  material  principle  (materia  primd). 

84.  PLACE  AND  SPACE.  —  From  the  concept  of  the  volume  or 
actual  extension  of  a  body  we  pass  immediately  to  that  of  the 
"  place  "  (locus)  which  it  occupies.  We  may  distinguish  between 
the  internal  and  the  external  place  of  a  body.  By  the  former  we 
understand  the  outer  (convex}  surface  of  the  body  itself,  regarded  as 
a  receptacle  containing  the  volume  of  the  body.  If,  therefore,  there 
were  only  one  body  in  existence  it  would  have  its  own  internal 
place  :  this  is  independent  of  other  bodies.  Not  so,  however, 
the  external  place  ;  for  by  the  external  place  of  a  body  we  mean 
the  immediately  surrounding  (concave}  surface,  formed  by  the  bodies 
which  circumscribe  the  body  in  question,  and  considered  formally 
as  an  immovable  container  of  this  body.  This  is  a  free  rendering 
of  Aristotle's  definition  :  Place  is  the  first  (or  immediate)  immov- 
able surface  (or  limit)  of  that  which  contains  a  body  ;  prima 
immobilis  superficies  ejus  quod  continet.1  If  a  hollow  sphere  were 
filled  with  water,  the  inner  or  concave  surface  of  the  sphere  would 
be  the  "  external  place  "  of  the  water.  Not,  however,  this  surface 
considered  materially,  but  formally  as  a  surface,  so  that  if  the 
sphere  could  be  removed,  and  another  instantaneously  substituted 
for  it,  the  water  would  still  be  contained  within  the  same,  formal 
surface  ;  its  locus  externus  would  remain  the  same.  And,  again, 
it  is  the  containing  surface  considered  as  immovable  or  as  circum- 
scribing that  definite  portion  of  space,  that  constitutes  the  locus 
externus  or  "  external  place  "  of  the  located  body  :  so  that  if  the 
sphere  with  the  water  were  moved  the  latter  would  thereby  obtain 
a  new  external  location,  for  though  the  containing  surface  be 
still  materially  and  formally  the  same,  it  is  no  longer  the  same 
as  a  locating  surface,  seeing  that  it  now  marks  off  a  portion  of 
space  different  from  that  marked  off  by  it  before  it  was  moved. 

Aristotle's  definition  defines  what  is  known  as  the  proper  ex- 
ternal place  of  a  body.  From  this  we  distinguish  the  common 


rb  rov  irepifXOVTOS  "ftpus  O.K.(V(\TOV  irpwrov,  TOUT'  CGTLV  6  r6iros.  —  Physic,  L. 
iv.,  ch.  iv.  (6). 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  319 

external  place  or  location  of  a  body :  understanding  by  the 
latter,  or  "  locus  communis"  the  whole  collection  of  spatial 
relations  of  the  body  in  question  to  all  the  bodies  in  its  immediate 
neighbourhood.  It  is  by  indicating  these  relations,  or  some  of 
them,  that  we  assign  the  Aristotelian  category,  or  extrinsic  de- 
nomination, Ubi.1 

Regarded  ontologically,  the  internal  place  of  a  body  is  an  abso- 
lute accident :  it  is  the  accident  which  gives  the  latter  concrete 
volume  or  external  extension,  and  it  is  not  really  distinct  from 
the  latter.  The  external  place  of  a  body  includes  in  addition  the 
spatial  relations  of  the  latter  to  other  bodies,  relations  grounded 
in  the  volumes  of  those  bodies. 

It  is  by  reason  of  these  spatial  relations  with  certain  bodies,  that  a  being 
is  said  to  be  "  present  "  in  a  certain  place.  A  corporeal  extended  substance 
is  said  to  occupy  space  circumscriptive,  or  by  having  parts  outside  parts  in 
the  place  it  occupies.  A  finite  or  created  spiritual  substance  is  said  to  occupy 
space  definitive,  inasmuch  as  it  can  naturally  exercise  its  influence  only  within 
certain  more  or  less  extended  spatial  limits  :  as  the  human  soul  does  within 
the  confines  of  the  body.2  The  Infinite  Being  is  said  to  occupy  space  repletive. 
The  actual  presence  of  God  in  all  real  space,  conserving  in  its  existence  all 
created,  contingent  reality,  is  called  the  Divine  Ubiquity.  The  perfection 
whereby  God  can  be  present  in  other  worlds  and  other  spaces  which  He  may 
actualize  is  called  the  Divine  Immensity. 

The  local  presence  of  a  finite  being  to  other  finite  beings  is  itself  a  positive 
perfection — based  on  its  actual  extension  if  it  be  an  extended  corporeal  sub- 
stance, or  on  its  power  of  operating  within  a  certain  space  if  it  be  a  spiritual  sub- 
stance. The  fact  that  in  the  case  of  a  finite  being  this  local  presence  is  itself 
limited,  is  at  once  a  corollary  and  an  index  of  the  finiteness  of  the  being  in  ques- 
tion. Only  the  Infinite  Being  is  omnipresent  or  ubiquitous.  But  every  finite 
being,  whether  corporeal  or  spiritual,  from  the  very  fact  that  it  exists  at  all, 
must  exist  somewhere  or  have  some  locus  internus,  and  it  must  have  some 
local  presence  if  there  are  other  corporeal,  extended  beings  in  existence.  Thus 
the  local  presence  of  a  being  is  a  (finite)  perfection  which  seems  to  be 
grounded  in  the  very  nature  itself  of  the  creature.3 

From  the  concept  of  place  we  pass  naturally  to  the  more  com- 
plex and  abstract  notion  of  space.  It  is,  of  course,  by  cognitive 
processes,  both  sentient  and  intellectual,  that  we  come  into  posses- 
sion of  the  abstract  concept  of  space.  These  processes  are  subjec- 

1  The  category  Situs  is  commonly  interpreted  to  signify  the  mutual  spatial  rela- 
tions or  dispositions  of  the  various  parts  of  a  body  in  the  place  actually  occupied  by 
the  latter. 

2  A  body  deprived  of  its  connatural  extension  exists  in  space  in  a  manner  anal- 
ogous to  that  in  which  the  soul  is  in  the  body.     The  Body  of  our  Divine  Lord  is  in 
the  Eucharist  in  this  manner — "  sacramentaliter  ". 

3  C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.t  §  624. 


320  ONTOLOGY 

tive  in  the  sense  that  they  are  processes  of  the  individual's  mental 
faculties.  Distinguishing  between  the  processes  and  the  object 
or  content  which  is  brought  into  consciousness,  or  put  in  presence 
of  the  mind,  by  means  of  them  ;  and  assuming  that  this  object 
or  content  is  not  a  mere  form  or  groove  of  our  cognitive  activity, 
not  a  mere  antecedent  condition  requisite  on  the  mental  side  for 
the  conscious  exercise  of  this  activity  on  its  data,  but  that  on  the 
contrary  it  is,  or  involves,  an  objective,  extramental  reality  appre- 
hended by  the  mind, — we  go  on  to  inquire  in  what  this  objective 
reality  consists.  In  approaching  the  question  we  must  first  note 
that  what  is  true  of  every  abstract  and  universal  concept  is  true 
of  the  concept  of  space,  viz.  that  the  abstractness  and  universality 
("  intentio  universalitatis  ")  of  real  being,  as  apprehended  by  the 
intellect,  are  modes  or  forms  of  thought,  entia  rationis,  logical 
conditions  and  relations  which  are  created  by  thought,  and  which 
exist  only  in  and  for  thought ;  while  the  reality  itself  is  the  ob- 
ject apprehended  in  these  modes  and  under  these  conditions : 
Universale  est  formaliter  in  mente  et  fundamentaliter  in  re.  Now 
through  the  concept  of  space  we  apprehend  a  reality.  Our  con- 
cept of  real  space  has  for  its  object  an  actual  reality.  What  is 
this  reality?  If  space  is  real,  in  what  does  its  reality  consist? 
We  answer  that  the  reality  which  we  apprehend  through  this 
concept  is  the  total  amount  of  the  actual  extension  or  magnitude 
of  all  created  and  coexisting  bodies  ;  not,  however,  this  total  mag- 
nitude considered  absolutely  and  in  itself,  but  as  endowed  with 
real  and  mutual  relations  of  all  its  parts  to  one  another^  relations 
which  are  apprehended  by  us  as  distances,  linear,  superficial,  and 
voluminal. 

Such,  then,  is  the  reality  corresponding  to  our  concept  of  real 
and  actual  space.  But  no  sooner  have  we  reached  this  concept 
than  we  may  look  at  its  object  in  the  abstract,  remove  mentally 
all  limits  from  it,  and  conceive  all  extended  bodies  as  actually 
non-existent.  What  is  the  result  ?  The  result  is  that  we  have 
now  present  to  our  minds  \ht  possibility  of  the  existence  of  ex- 
tended bodies,  and  a  concomitant  imagination  image  (which  mem- 
ory will  not  allow  us  to  banish  from  consciousness)  of  a  vast 
and  boundless  emptiness,  an  indefinite  and  unmeasurable  vacuum 
in  which  bodies  were  or  may  be.  The  intellectual  concept  is 
now  not  a  concept  of  any  actual  object,  but  of  a  ft\v&  possibility : 
the  possibility  of  a  corporeal,  extended  universe.  This  is  the 

1  Cf.  ZIGLIARA,  Ontologia  (35),  iv. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  321 

concept  of  what  we  call  ideal  or  possible  space ;  and  like  the 
concept  of  any  other  possible  reality  it  is  derived  by  us  from 
our  experience  of  actual  reality, — in  this  case  from  our  experience 
of  extended  bodies  as  actually  existing.  The  corporeal  universe 
has  not  existed  from  all  eternity,  but  it  was  possible  from  all 
eternity.  When  we  think  of  that  possibility  as  antecedent  to 
all  creation,  we  are  thinking  of  bodies,  and  of  their  extension,  as 
possible  ;  and  the  concept  of  their  total  extension  as  possible  is  the 
concept  of  ideal  or  possible  space.  This  concept  is,  through  a  psy- 
chological necessity,  accompanied  by  an  imagination  image  of  what 
we  call  imaginary  space :  the  unlimited  vacuity  which  preceded 
corporeal  creation,  which  would  still  persist  were  the  latter  totally 
annihilated,  which  reaches  out  indefinitely  beyond  its  actual  limits, 
which  imagination  pictures  for  us  as  a  receptacle  in  which  bodies 
may  exist  but  which  all  the  time  our  reason  assures  us  is  actually 
nothing,  being  really  only  the  known  possibility  of  corporeal 
creatures.  This  familiar  notion  of  an  empty  receptacle  for  bodies 
is  what  we  have  in  mind  when  we  think  of  bodies  as  existing  "  in 
space ".  Hence  we  say  that  space,  as  conceived  by  the  human 
mind,  is  not  a  mere  subjective  form  of  cognition,  a  mere  ens  rationis, 
inasmuch  as  our  concept  has  a  foundation  in  reality,  viz.  the  actual 
extension  of  all  existing  bodies  ;  nor  is  it  on  the  other  hand  simply 
a  real  entity,  because  this  actual  extension  of  bodies  does  not 
really  exist  in  the  manner  in  which  we  apprehend  it  under  the 
abstract  concept  of  space,  as  a  mere  possibility,  or  empty  re- 
ceptacle, of  bodies.  Space  is  therefore  an  ens  rationis  cum  funda- 
mento  in  re. 

A  great  variety  of  interesting  but  abstruse  questions  arise  from  the  con- 
sideration of  space  ;  but  they  belong  properly  to  Cosmology  and  Natural 
Theology.  For  example  :  Is  real  space  actually  infinite  in  magnitude,  or 
finite  ?  In  other  words,  besides  the  whole  solar  system — which  is  in  reality 
merely  one  star  plus  its  planets  and  their  satellites, — is  there  in  existence  an 
actually  infinite  multitude  of  such  stellar  worlds  ?  It  is  not  likely  that  this 
can  ever  be  determined  empirically.  Many  philosophers  maintain  that  the 
question  must  be  answered  in  the  negative,  inasmuch  as  an  actually  infinite 
multitude  is  impossible.  Others,  however,  deny  that  the  impossibility  of  an 
actually  infinite  multitude  can  be  proved.1  Again,  within  the  limits  of  the 
actual  corporeal  universe,  are  there  really  vacant  spaces,  or  is  all  space  with- 
in these  limits  actually  (or  even  necessarily)  filled  with  an  all-pervading  ether 
or  corporeal  medium  of  some  sort  ?  How  would  local  motion  be  possible  if  all 
space  were  full  of  impenetrable  matter  ?  How  would  the  real  interaction  of 

1  Cf.  NYS,  La  Notion  d'Espace  (Louvain,  1901),  pp.  95  sqq. — La  Notion  de  Temps 
(Louvain,  1898),  pp.  123  sqq. 

21 


322  ONTOLOGY 

distant  bodies  on  one  another  be  possible  if  there  were  only  vacant  space 
between  them  ?  Is  the  real  volume  or  extension  of  a  corporeal  substance  (as 
distinct  from  its  apparent  volume,  which  is  supposed  to  include  interstices,  or 
spaces  not  filled  with  that  body)  actually  or  necessarily  unchangeable  ?  Or 
is  the  internal  quantity  of  a  body  actually  or  necessarily  unchangeable  ? 
Can  more  than  one  individual  corporeal  substance  simultaneously  occupy  ex- 
actly the  same  space  ?  (This  is  not  possible  naturally,  for  impenetrability  is 
a  natural  consequence  of  local  extension  ;  but  it  is  possible  miraculously — if 
all  the  bodies,  or  all  except  one,  be  miraculously  deprived  of  local  or  spatial 
extension.)  Can  the  same  individual  body  be  present  at  the  same  time  in 
totally  different  and  distant  places  ?  (Not  naturally,  of  course ;  but  how  it 
can  happen  even  miraculously  is  a  more  difficult  question  than  the  preceding 
one.  It  is  in  virtue  of  its  actual  or  local  extension  that  a  body  is  present 
sensibly  in  a  definite  place.  Deprived  miraculously  of  this  extension  it  can 
be  simultaneously  in  several  places,  as  our  Blessed  Lord's  Body  is  in  the 
Eucharist.  But  if  a  body  has  its  natural  local  extension  at  one  definite  place, 
does  this  extension  so  confine  its  presence  to  this  place  that  it  cannot  be  sim- 
ultaneously present — miraculously,  and  without  its  local  extension — at  other 
places  ?  The  most  we  can  say  is  that  the  absolute  impossibility  of  this  is 
neither  self-evident  nor  capable  of  cogent  proof.  The  Body  of  our  Lord  has 
its  natural  local  extension  in  heaven — for  heaven,  which  will  be  the  abode  of 
the  glorified  bodies  of  the  blessed  after  the  general  resurrection,  must  be  not 
merely  a  state  or  condition,  but  a  place— and  at  the  same  time  it  is  sacra- 
mentally  present  in  many  places  on  earth.) 

85.  TIME:  ITS  APPREHENSION  AND  MEASUREMENT.— If  the 
concept  of  space  is  difficult  to  analyse,  and  gives  rise  to  some 
practically  insoluble  problems,  this  is  still  more  true  of  the  con- 
cept of  time.  "  What,  then,  is  time  ? "  exclaims  St.  Augustine 
in  his  Confessions. 1  "  If  no  one  asks  me,  I  know  ;  but  if  I  am 
asked  to  explain  it,  then  I  do  not  know!"  We  reach  the 
notion  of  space  through  our  external  perception  of  extension 
by  the  senses  of  sight  and  touch.  So  also  we  derive  the  notion 
of  time  from  our  perception  of  motion  or  change,  and  mainly  from 
our  consciousness  of  change  and  succession  in  our  own  conscious 
states.  The  concept  of  time  involves  immediately  two  other  con- 
cepts, that  of  duration,  and  that  of  succession.  Duration,  or  con- 
tinuance in  existence,  is  of  two  kinds,  permanent  and  successive. 
Permanent  duration  is  the  duration  of  an  immutable  being, 
formally  and  in  so  far  as  it  is  immutable.  Successive  dura- 
tion is  the  continued  existence  or  duration  of  a  being  that  is 
subject  to  change,  formally  and  in  so  far  as  it  is  mutable.  Now 
real  change  involves  a  continuous  succession  of  real  states,  it  is  a 
continuous  process  or  fieri ;  and  it  is  the  duration  of  a  being  sub- 

1 "  Quid  est  ergo  tempus  ?    Si  nemo  ex  me  quaerat,  scio  ;  si  quaerenti  explicate, 
velim,  nescio,"—  Qonfess,  L.  xi.,  qh.  xiv. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  323 

ject  to  such  change  that  we  call  time  or  temporal  duration.  Had 
we  no  consciousness  of  change,  or  succession  of  states,  we  could 
have  no  notion  of  time ;  though  we  might  have  a  notion  of  un- 
changing duration  if  per  impossibile  our  cognitive  activity  were  it- 
self devoid  of  any  succession  of  conscious  states  and  had  for  its 
object  only  unchanging  reality.  But  since  our  cognitive  activity 
is  de  facto  successive  we  can  apprehend  permanent  or  unchanging 
duration,  not  as  it  is  in  itself,  but  only  after  the  analogy  of  suc- 
cessive or  temporal  duration  (86).  The  continuous  series  of 
successive  states  involved  in  change  is,  therefore,  the  real  and  ob- 
jective content  of  our  notion  of  time ;  just  as  the  co-existing  total 
of  extension  forms  the  content  of  our  notion  of  space.  The  con- 
cept of  space  is  the  concept  of  something  static ;  that  of  time  is 
the  concept  of  something  kinetic.  Time  is  the  continuity  of 
change :  where  there  is  change  there  is  time ;  without  change 
time  would  be  inconceivable.  Change  involves  succession,  and 
succession  involves  the  temporal  elements  of  "  before"  and 
"after,"  separated  by  the  indivisible  limiting  factor  called  the 
"now"  or  "  present  instant ".  The  "past"  and  the  "future" 
are  the  two  parts  of  time,  while  the  " present  instant"  is  not  a 
part  of  time,  but  a  point  of  demarcation  at  which  the  future  flows 
into  the  past.  Change  is  a  reality  ;  it  is  a  real  mode  of  the  ex- 
istence of  mutable  things ;  but  neither  the  immediately  past 
state,  nor  the  immediately  future  state  of  a  changing  reality,  are 
actual  at  the  present  instant :  it  is  only  to  the  permanent,  abiding 
mind,  apprehending  real  change,  and  endowed  with  memory  and 
expectation,  that  the  past  and  the  future  are  actually  (and,  of 
course,  only  ideally,  not  really)  present.  And  it  is  only  by 
holding  past  and  future  in  present  consciousness,  by  distinguish- 
ing mentally  between  them,  by  counting  or  measuring  the  con- 
tinuous flow  of  successive  states  from  future  to  past,  through  the 
present  instant,  that  the  mind  comes  into  possession  of  the  con- 
cept of  time.1  The  mind  thus  apprehends  time  as  the  measure 
of  the  continuous  flow  of  successive  states  in  things  subject  to 
change.  As  thus  apprehended,  time  is  not  merely  the  reality  of 
change  :  it  is  the  successive  continuity  or  duration  of  change  con- 
sidered as  a  measure  of  change.  It  is  that  within  which  all  changes 
are  conceived  to  happen  :  just  as  space  is  conceived  as  that  within 

1 "  Cum  enim  intelligimus  extrema  diversa  alicujus  medii,  et  anima  dicat,  ilia 
esse  duo  nunc,  hoc  prius,  illud  posterius  quasi  numerando  prius  et  posterius  in  motu, 
tune  hoc  dicimys  esse  tempus,"-— St,  THOMAS,  in  Phys.,  L.  iv.,  lect.  17", 


324  ONTOLOGY 

which  all  extended  things  are  conceived  to  exist.  We  have  said 
that  without  real  change  or  motion  there  could  be  no  time.  We 
can  now  add  that  without  a  mind  to  apprehend  and  measure 
this  motion  there  could  be  no  time.  As  St.  Thomas  declares, 
following  Aristotle  :  Si  non  esset  anima  non  esset  tempus. l  For 
time,  as  apprehended  by  means  of  our  abstract  and  universal 
concept,  is  not  simply  a  reality,  but  a  reality  endowed  with  logical 
relations,  or,  in  other  words,  a  logical  entity  grounded  in  reality, 
an  ens  rationis  cum  fundamento  in  re. 

This  brings  us  to  Aristotle's  classic  definition,2  which  is  at 
once  pithy  and  pregnant :  Tovro  yap  ea"uv  o  xpovos,  dpt6fj,b<;  K.IVT)- 
<T€0)9  icara  TO  irporepov  teal  v&Tepov  :  Tempus  est  numerus  motus 
secundum  prius  etposterius\  Time  is  the  measure  of  motion  or 
change  by  what  we  conceive  as  before  and  after,  or  future and  past, 
in  its  process.  Every  change  involves  its  own  intrinsic  flow  of 
states  from  future  to  past.  It  is  by  mentally  distinguishing  these 
states,  and  by  thus  computing,  counting,  numbering,  the  con- 
tinuous flow  or  change,  that  we  derive  from  the  latter  the  notion 
of  time.3  If,  then,  we  consider  all  created  things,  all  things 
subject  to  change,  we  shall  realize  that  real  time  commenced 
with  the  creation  of  the  first  of  them  and  will  continue  as  long  as 
they  (or  any  of  them)  continue  to  exist.  We  thus  arrive  at  a 
conception  of  time  in  general,  analogous  to  that  of  space  :  the 
whole  continuous  series  of  successions,  in  changing  things,  from 
future  to  past,  regarded  as  that  in  which  these  changes  occur,  and 
which  is  the  measure  of  them. 

Here,  too,  as  in  the  case  of  space,  we  can  distinguish  real 
time,  which  is  the  total  duration  of  actual  changes,  from  ideal  or 
imaginary  time  which  is  the  conceived  and  imagined  duration  of 
merely  possible  changes. 

But  a  more  important  distinction  is  that  between  intrinsic  or 
internal  time,  or  the  duration  of  any  concrete  mutable  reality  con- 
sidered in  itself,  and  extrinsic  or  external  time,  which  is  some  other 
extrinsic  temporal  duration  with  which  we  compare,  and  by  which 

1  Sentent.,  Dist.  xix.,  q.  ii.,  art.  i. — Cf.  Lect.  xxiii.  in  iv.  Physic. 

2  Physic.,  iv.,  ch.  xi.  — Cf.  ST.  THOMAS  in  loc. 

3 "  The  conception  of  variation  united  with  sameness  is  not,  however,  the 
whole  cognition  of  time.  For  this  the  mind  must  be  able  to  combine  in  thought  two 
different  movements  or  pulsations  of  consciousness,  so  as  to  represent  an  interval 
between  them.  It  must  hold  together  two  nows,  conceiving  them,  in  succession, 
yet  uniting  them  through  that  intellectual  synthetic  activity  by  which  we  enumerate 
a  collection  of  objects — a  process  or  act  which  carries  concomitantly  the  conscious- 
ness of  its  own  continuous  unity." — MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  xvii. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  325 

we  may  measure,  the  former  duration.  Every  change  or  motion 
has  its  own  internal  time  ;  and  this  is  what  we  have  been  so  far  en- 
deavouring to  analyse.  If  two  men  start  at  the  same  instant  to  walk 
in  the  same  direction,  and  if  one  walk  three  miles  and  the  other 
four,  while  the  hands  of  a  watch  mark  the  lapse  of  an  hour,  the  ex- 
ternal time  of  each  walk  will  be  the  same,  will  coincide  with  one  and 
the  same  motion  of  the  hands  of  the  watch  used  as  a  measure.  But 
the  internal  time  of  the  four-mile  walk  will  be  greater  than  that 
of  the  three-mile  walk.  The  former  will  be  a  greater  amount  of 
change  than  the  latter ;  and  therefore  its  internal  time,  estimated 
by  this  amount  absolutely,  will  be  greater  than  that  of  the  latter 
estimated  by  its  amount  absolutely.1  The  greater  the  amount  of 
a  change  the  greater  the  internal  time-duration  or  series  of 
successive  states  which  measures  this  change  absolutely.2 

Just  as  the  category  Where  is  indicated  by  the  spatial  re- 
lations of  a  body  to  other  bodies,  so  the  category  When  is  in- 
dicated, in  regard  to  any  event  or  process,  by  its  commensuration 
or  comparison  with  other  events  or  processes. 

This  brings  us  to  the  notion  of  measurement.  To  measure 
anything  quantitatively  is  to  apply  to  it  successively  some 
quantitative  unit  taken  as  a  standard  and  to  count  the  number 
of  times  it  contains  this  unit.  This  is  a  process  of  mentally 
breaking  up  continuous  quantity  or  magnitude — whether  per- 
manent or  successive,  i.e.  whether  extension  or  motion — into 
discontinuous  quantity  or  multitude.  If  the  measurement  of 
permanent  quantity  by  spatial  units,  and  the  choosing  of  such 

1  That  is,  provided  we  abstract  from  all  comparison  of  this  internal  time  dura- 
tion with  that  of  any  other  current  of  conscious  experiences  in  the  estimating  mind. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  we  always  and  necessarily  compare  the  time  duration  of  any 
particular   experienced  change  with  that  of  the  remaining  portion  of  the  whole 
current  of  successive  conscious  states  which  make  up  our  mental  life.     And  thus 
we  feel,  not  that  the  four-mile  walk  had  a  longer  time  duration  than  the  three-mile 
walk,  but  rather  that  it  took  place  at  a  quicker  rate,  more  rapidly,  than  the  latter. 
But  if  a  mind  which  had  no  other  consciousness  of  change  whatsoever  than,  e.g. 
that   of  the  two  walks  experienced  successively,   no  other  standard  change  with 
which  to  compare  each  of  them  as  it  occurred — if  such  a  mind  experienced  each  in 
this  way,  would  it  pronounce  the  four-mile  walk  to  have  occupied  a  longer  time 
than  the  three-mile  walk  ? — Cf.   infra,  p.  327. 

2  This  is  true  on  the  assumption  that  the  intrinsic  time-duration  of  a  successive, 
continuous   change,  its  divisibility  into  distinct  "nows"  related  as  "before  "and 
"  alter,"  is  really  identical  withtthe  continuous,  successive  states  constituting  the  change 
itself,  and  is  not  a  really  distinct  mode  superadded  to  this  change,  a  continuous  series  of 
"  quandocatioites,"  distinct  from  the  change,  and  giving  the  latter  its  temporal  dura- 
tion.    But  many  philosophers  hold  that  in  all  creatures  duration  is  a  mode  of  their 
existence  really  distinct  from  the  creatures  themselves  that  have  this  duration  or 
continued  existence. — Cf.  infra,  §  86. 


326  ONTOLOGY 

units,  are  difficult  processes,1  those  of  measuring  successive 
quantity  and  fixing  on  temporal  units  are  more  difficult  still.  Is 
there  any  natural  motion  or  change  of  a  general  character,  where- 
by we  can  measure  (externally)  the  time-duration  of  all  other 
changes?  The  motions  of  the  earth  itself — on  its  axis  and 
around  the  sun — at  once  suggest  themselves.  And  these  motions 
form  in  fact  the  natural  general  standard  for  measuring  the  time 
of  all  other  events  in  the  universe.  All  artificial  or  mechanical 
devices,  such  as  hour-glasses,  watches,  clocks,  chronometers,  etc., 
are  simply  contrivances  for  the  more  convenient  application  of 
that  general  and  natural  standard  to  all  particular  events. 

It  requires  a  little  reflection  to  realize  that  all  our  means  of 
measuring  time-duration  can  only  attain  to  approximate  accuracy, 
inasmuch  as  our  faculties  of  sense  perception,  no  matter  by  what 
devices  they  are  aided,  are  so  limited  in  range  and  penetration 
that  fluctuations  which  fall  below  the  minima  sensibilia  cannot 
be  detected.  It  is  a  necessary  condition  of  any  motion  used  as  a 
standard  for  time-measurement  that  it  be  regular.  That  the 
standard  motions  we  actually  employ  are  absolutely  regular  we 
have  no  guarantee.  We  can  test  their  regularity  only  up  to  the 
point  at  which  our  power  of  detecting  irregularity  fails. 

Reflection  will  also  show  that  our  appreciation  of  time- 
duration  is  also  relative,  not  absolute.  It  is  always  a  comparison 
of  one  flow  or  current  of  conscious  experiences  with  another. 
It  is  the  greater  regularity  of  astronomical  motions,  as  com- 
pared with  changes  or  processes  experienced  as  taking  place 
within  ourselves,  that  causes  us  to  fix  on  the  former  as  the  more 
suitable  standard  for  the  measurement  of  time.  "  There  is  indeed," 
writes  Father  Maher,2 "  a  certain  rhythm  in  many  of  the  processes 
of  our  organic  life,  such  as  respiration,  circulation,  and  the  re- 
current needs  of  food  and  sleep,  which  probably  contribute  much 
to  our  power  of  estimating  duration.  .  .  .  The  irregular  character 
and  varying  duration  of  conscious  states,  however,  soon  bring 
home  to  us  the  unfitness  of  these  subjective  phenomena  to  serve 
as  a  standard  measure  of  time."  Moreover,  our  estimate  of 
duration  is  largely  dependent  on  the  nature  of  the  estimated 
experiences  and  of  our  mental  attitude  towards  them  :  "  A  period 
with  plenty  of  varied  incident,  such  as  a  fortnight's  travel,  passes 
rapidly  at  the  time.  Whilst  we  are  interested  in  each  successive 
experience  we  have  little  spare  attention  to  notice  the  duration 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  246,  pp.  201  sqq.  2  op.  cit.,  c.  xvii. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  327 

of  the  experience.  There  is  almost  complete  lapse  of  the 
*  enumerating '  activity.  But  in  retrospect  such  a  period  expands, 
because  it  is  estimated  by  the  number  and  variety  of  the  im- 
pressions which  it  presents  to  recollection.  On  the  other  hand 
a  dull,  monotonous,  or  unattractive  occupation,  which  leaves  much 
of  our  mental  energy  free  to  advert  to  its  duration,  is  over-esti- 
mated whilst  taking  place.  A  couple  of  hours  spent  impatiently 
waiting  for  a  train,  a  few  days  in  idleness  on  board  ship,  a  week 
confined  to  one's  room,  are  often  declared  to  constitute  an  *  age '. 
But  when  they  are  past  such  periods,  being  empty  of  incident, 
shrink  up  into  very  small  dimensions.  .  .  .  Similarly,  recent  inter- 
vals are  exaggerated  compared  with  equal  periods  more  remote. 
Whilst  as  we  grow  older  and  new  experiences  become  fewer  and 
less  impressive,  each  year  at  its  close  seems  shorter  than  its  pre- 
decessor." 1 

From  those  facts  it  would  seem  perfectly  legitimate  to  draw  this  rather 
surprising  inference  :  that  if  the  rate  of  all  the  changes  taking  place  in  the 
universe  were  to  be  suddenly  and  simultaneously  altered  in  the  same  direction — 
all  increased  or  all  diminished  in  the  same  degree — and  if  our  powers  of 
perception  were  simultaneously  so  altered  as  to  be  readjusted  to  this  new 
rate  of  change,  we  could  not  become  aware  of  the  alteration?  Supposing, 
for  instance,  that  the  rate  of  motion  were  doubled,  the  same  amount  of  change 
would  take  place  in  the  new  day  as  actually  took  place  in  the  old.  The  external 
or  comparative  time  of  all  movements — that  is  to  say,  the  time  of  which  alone  we 
can  have  any  appreciation — would  be  the  same  as  of  old.  The  new  day  would, 
of  course,  appear  only  half  as  long  as  the  old  to  a  mind  not  readjusted  to 
the  new  conditions ;  but  this  would  still  be  external  time.  But  would  the 
internal,  intrinsic  time  of  each  movement  be  unaltered  ?  It  would  be  the 
same  for  the  readjusted  mind  as  it  was  previously  for  the  mind  adjusted  to 
these  previous  conditions.  By  an  unaltered  mind,  however,  by  the  Divine 
Mind,  for  instance,  the  same  amount  of  motion  would  be  seen  to  constitute 
the  same  movement  under  both  conditions,  but  to  take  place  twice  as  quickly 
under  the  new  conditions  as  it  did  under  the  old.  This  again,  however,  involves 
a  comparison,  and  thus  informs  us  merely  of  external  or  relative  time.  If  we 
identify  intrinsic  time  with  amount  of  change,  making  the  latter  the  measure 
of  the  former,  we  must  conclude  that  alteration  in  the  rate  of  a  motion  does 
not  alter  its  absolute  time  :  and  this  is  evident  when  we  reflect  that  the  very 
notion  of  a  rate  of  motion  involves  the  comparison  of  the  latter  with  some 
other  motion.3  Finally,  we  have  no  positive  conception  of  the  manner  in 

lop.  cit.,  c.  xvii.  2C/.  NYS,  La  Notion  de  Temps  (Lovain,  1898),  p.  104. 

3  The  fact  that  we  can  perceive  and  estimate  temporal  duration  only  extrin- 
sically,  and  in  ultimate  analysis  by  comparison  with  the  flow  of  our  own  conscious 
states,  and  that  therefore  we  can  have  no  perception  or  conception  of  the  intrinsic 
time  duration  of  any  change,  seems  to  have  been  overlooked  by  DE  SAN  (Cosmologia, 
pp.  528-9)  when  he  argues  from  our  perception  of  different  rates  of  motion,  in  favour 


328  ONTOLOGY 

which   time  duration  is  related  to,  or  known  by,  the  Divine  Eternal  Mind, 
which  is  present  to  all  time — past,  present  and  future. 

Besides  the  question  of  the  relativity  of  time,  there  are  many  other  curious 
and  difficult  questions  which  arise  from  a  consideration  of  time-duration,  but 
a  detailed  consideration  of  them  belongs  to  Cosmology.  We  will  merely 
indicate  a  few  of  them.  How  far  is  time  reversible^  at  least  in  the  case  of 
purely  mechanical  movements  ? J  Had  time  a  beginning  ?  We  know  from 
Revelation  that  de  facto  it  had.  But  can  we  determine  by  the  light  of  reason 
alone  whether  or  not  it  must  have  had  a  beginning  ?  The  greatest  philosophers 
are  divided  as  to  possibility  or  impossibility  of  created  reality  existing  from  all 
eternity.  St.  Thomas  has  stated,  as  his  considered  opinion,  that  the  impossibility 
of  creatio  ab  aeterno  cannot  be  proved.  If  a  series  of  creatures  could  have  ex- 
isted successively  from  all  eternity,  and  therefore  without  any  first  term  of  the 
series,  this  would  involve  the  possibility  of  an  actually  infinite  multitude  oi 
creatures ;  but  an  actually  infinite  multitude  of  creatures,  whether  existing 
simultaneously  or  successively,  is  regarded  by  most  philosophers  as  being  self- 
contradictory  and  intrinsically  impossible.  And  this  although  the  Divine 
Essence,  being  infinitely  imi table  ad  extia^  and  being  clearly  comprehended  as 
such  by  the  Divine  Mind,  contains  virtually  the  Divine  exemplars  of  an  infinite 
multitude  of  possible  creatures.  Those  who  defend  the  possibility  of  an  actually 
infinite  multitude  of  creatures  consider  this  fact  of  the  infinite  imitability  of  the 
Divine  Essence  as  the  ground  of  this  possibility.  On  the  other  hand,  those 
who  hold  that  an  actually  infinite  multitude  is  self-contradictory  deny  the 
validity  of  this  argument  from  possibility  to  actuality  ;  and  they  bring  forward 
such  serious  considerations  and  arguments  in  favour  of  their  own  view  that  this 
latter  has  been  at  all  times  much  more  commonly  advocated  than  the  former 
one.2  Will  time  have  an  end  ?  All  the  evidence  of  the  physical  sciences  confirms 
the  truth  of  the  Christian  faith  that  external  time,  as  measured  by  the  mo- 
tions of  the  heavens,  will  have  an  end.  But  the  internal  or  intrinsic  time  which 
will  be  the  measure  of  the  activities  of  immortal  creatures  will  have  no  end.3 

86.  DURATION  OF  IMMUTABLE  BEING:  ETERNITY. — We 
have  seen  that  duration  is  the  perseverance  or  continuance  of  a 
being  in  its  existence.  The  duration  of  the  Absolutely  Immutable 
Being  is  a  positive  perfection  identical  with  the  essence  itself  of 
this  Being.  It  is  a  duration  without  beginning,  without  end, 
without  change  or  succession,  a  permanent  as  distinct  from  a 
successive  duration,  for  it  is  the  duration  of  the  Necessary  Being, 
whose  essence  is  Pure  Actuality.  This  duration  is  eternity : 
an  interminable  duration  existing  all  together.  Aeternitas  est  in- 
terminabilis  duratio  tota  simul  existens.  This  is  the  common 
definition  of  eternity  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  term — absolute 

of  the  view  that  time  duration   is  not  really  identical  with  motion  or  change, 
but  a  superadded  mode,  really  distinct  from  the  latter. 

1  Cf.  NYS,  La  Notion  de  Temps,  pp.  85  sqq. 

2  Cf.  NYS,  op.  cit.t  pp.  120  sqq.,  for  a  defence  of  the  view  that  an  actually  infinite 
multitude  involves  no  contradiction. 

9  ibid.,  pp.  162-9. 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  &$ 

or  necessary  eternity.  The  word  "  interminabilis "  connotes 
a  positive  perfection  :  the  exclusion  of  beginning  and  end.  The 
word  "  tota  "  does  not  imply  that  the  eternity  has  parts.  The 
expression  " tota  shnul"  excludes  the  imperfection  which  is 
characteristic  of  time  duration,  viz.  the  succession  of  "  before  " 
and  "  after  ".  The  definition  given  by  Boetius *  emphasizes  these 
points,  as  also  the  indefectible  character  of  immutable  life  in 
the  Eternal  Being  :  Aeternitas  est  interminabilis  vitae  tota  simul  et 
prefecta  possessio. 

There  is,  in  the  next  place,  a  kind  of  duration  which  has  been 
called  hypothetical,  relative,  or  borrowed  eternity :  aeternitas 
hypothetica,  relativayparticipata,  also  called  by  scholastics  "  aeviter- 
nitas  ".  It  is  the  duration  in  existence  of  a  being  that  is  con- 
tingent, but  of  its  nature  incorruptible,  immortal,  such  as  the 
human  soul  or  a  pure  spirit.  Even  if  such  a  being  existed  from 
all  eternity  its  existence  would  be  contingent,  dependent  on  a 
real  principle  distinct  from  itself:  its  duration,  therefore,  would 
not  be  eternity  in  the  strict  sense.  On  the  other  hand,  once 
created  by  God,  its  nature  would  demand  conservation  without 
end  ;  nor  could  it  naturally  cease  to  exist,  though  absolutely 
speaking  it  could  cease  to  exist  were  God  to  withdraw  from  it 
His  conserving  power.  Its  duration,  therefore,  differs  from  the 
duration  of  corporeal  creatures  which  are  by  nature  subject  to 
change,  decay,  and  cessation  of  their  being.  A  contingent 
spiritual  substance  has  by  nature  a  beginning  to  its  duration,  or  at 
least  a  duration  which  is  not  essential  to  it  but  dependent  on  the 
Necessary  Being,  a  duration,  however,  which  is  naturally  without 
end ;  whereas  the  duration  of  the  corporeal  being  has  by  nature 
both  a  beginning  and  an  end. 

But  philosophers  are  not  agreed  as  to  the  nature  and  ground  of  the 
distinction  between  these  two  kinds  of  duration  in  contingent  beings.  No 
contingent  being  is  self-existent,  neither  has  any  contingent  being  the  principle 
of  its  own  duration  in  its  own  essence.  Just  as  it  cannot  begin  to  exist  of  itself, 
so  neither  can  it  continue  to  exist  of  itself.  At  the  same  time,  granted  that  it 
has  obtained  from  God  actual  existence,  some  kind  or  degree  of  duration,  of 
continuance  in  that  existence,  seems  to  be  naturally  due  to  its  essence.  Other- 
wise conservation  would  be  not  only  really  but  formally  a  continued  creation. 
It  is  such  indeed  on  the  part  of  God  :  in  God  there  is  no  variety  of  activity. 
But  on  the  part  of  the  creature,  the  preservation  of  the  latter  in  existence,  and 
therefore  some  degree  of  duration,  seems  to  be  due  to  it  on  the  hypothesis 
that  it  has  been  brought  into  existence  at  all.  The  conserving  influence  of 
God  is  to  its  duration  in  existence  what  the  concurring  influence  of  God  is  to 

1  De  Consolatione,  L.  v.,  pr.  ult. 


330  ONTOLOGY 

the  exercise  of  its  activities.1  In  this  sense  the  duration  of  a  finite  being  in 
existence  is  a  positive  perfection  which  we  may  regard  as  a  property  of  its 
nature.  But  is  this  perfection  or  property  of  the  creature  which  we  call 
duration,  (a)  essentially  successive  in  all  creatures,  spiritual  as  well  as  corporeal  ? 
And  (£)  is  it  really  identical  with  their  actual  existence  (or  with  the  reality  of 
whatever  change  or  actualization  occurs  to  their  existence),  or  it  is  a  mode  of 
this  existence  or  change,  really  distinct  from  the  latter  and  conferring  upon 
the  latter  the  perfection  of  continuity  or  persistence  ? 

This,  at  all  events,  is  universally  admitted  :  that  we  cannot  become  aware 
of  any  duration  otherwise  than  through  our  apprehension  of  change ;  that  we 
have  direct  knowledge  only  of  successive  duration ;  that  we  can  conceive  the 
permanent  duration  of  immutable  reality  only  after  the  analogy  of  successive 
duration,  or  as  the  co-existence  of  immutable  reality  with  the  successive 
duration  of  mutable  things. 

Now  some  philosophers  identify  successive  duration  with  change,  and  hold 
that  successive  duration  is  formally  the  duration  of  things  subject  to  change  ; 
that  in  so  far  as  a  being  is  subject  to  change  its  duration  is  successive,  and  in 
so  far  as  it  is  free  from  change  its  duration  approaches  the  essentially  per- 
manent duration  of  the  Eternal,  Immutable  Being ;  that  therefore  the  duration 
of  corporeal,  corruptible,  mortal  beings  \spar  excellence  successive  or  temporal 
duration  (tempus} ;  that  spiritual  beings,  which  are  substantially  immutable, 
but  nevertheless  have  a  successive  series  of  spiritual  activities,  have  a  sort  of 
duration  more  perfect,  because  more  permanent,  than  mere  temporal  duration, 
but  less  perfect,  because  less  permanent,  than  eternal  duration  (aevum^ 
aeviternitas) ;  while  the  Absolutely  Immutable  Being  alone  has  perfect  per- 
manent  duration  (aeternitas'}^  It  is  not  clear  whether  according  to  this  view 
we  should  distinguish  between  the  duration  of  spiritual  substances  as  permanent, 
and  that  of  their  acts  as  successive  ;  or  why  we  should  not  attribute  permanent 
duration  to  corporeal  substances  and  their  permanent  accidents,  confining 
successive  duration  formally  to  motion  or  change  itseif.  It  is,  moreover, 
implied  in  this  view  that  duration  is  not  any  really  distinct  perfection  or  mode 
superadded  to  the  actuality  of  the  being  that  endures. 

Other  philosophers  hold  that  all  duration  of  creatures  is  successive  ;  that 

1  C/.  KLEUTGEN,  op.  cit.,  §  624. 

2  "  Est   ergo  dicendum,  quod,  cum  aeternitas   sit   mensura  esse  permanentis 
secundum  quod  aliquid  recedit  a  permanentia  essendi,  secundum  hoc  recedit  ab 
aeternitate.     Quaedam  autem  sic  recedunt  a  permanentia  essendi,  quod  esse  eorum 
est  subjectum  transmutationis,  vel  in  transmutatiose  consistit ;  et  hujusmodi  men- 
surantur  tempore,  sicut  omnis  motus,  et  etiam  esse  omnium  corruptibilium.     Quaedam 
vero  recedunt  minus  a  permanentia  essendi,  quia  esse  eorum  nee  in  transmutatione 
consistit  nee  est  subjectum  transmutationis  ;  tamen  habent  transmutationem  adjunc- 
tam  vel  in  actu  vel  in  potentia  .  .  .  patet  de   angelis,  quod  scilicet  habent  esse 
intransmutabile   cum   transmutabilitate  secundum   electionem,  quantum  ad  eorum 
naturam   pertinet,  et  cum   transmutabilitate   intelligentiarum,   et  affectionum,   et 
locorum   suo  modo.     Et  ideo  hujusmodi  mensurantur  aevo,  quod  est  medium  inter 
aetermtatem  et  tempus.     Esse  autem  quod  mensurat  aeternitas,  nee  est  nutabile  nee 
mutabilitati  adjunctum.    Sic  ergo  tempus  habet  prius  et  posterius,  aevum  non  habet  in 
se  prius  et  posterius,  sed  ei  conjungi  possunt ;  aeternitas  autem  non  habet  prius 
neque  posterius,  neque  ea  compatitur." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  x.,  art.  5, 


QUANTITY,  SPACE  AND  TIME  331 

no  individual  creature  has  a  mixture  of  permanent  and  successive  duration  ; 
that  this  successive  duration  is  really  distinct  from  that  which  endures  by 
means  of  it ;  that  it  is  really  distinct  even  from  the  reality  of  change  or  motion 
itself;  that  it  is  a  real  mode  the  formal  function  of  which  is  to  confer  on  the 
enduring  reality  a  series  of  actualities  in  the  order  of  "  succession  of  posterior 
to  prior  "  a  series  of  intrinsic  quandocationes  (analagous  to  the  intrinsic  loca- 
tions which  their  extension  confers  upon  bodies  in  space).  These  philosophers 
distinguish  between  continuous  or  (indefinitely)  divisible  successive  duration, 
the  (indefinitely  divisible)  parts  of  which  are  "past  "  and  "future,"  and  the 
present  not  a  "  part  "  but  only  an  "  indivisible  limit "  between  the  two  parts  ; 
and  discontinuous  or  indivisible  successive  duration,  whose  parts  are  separate 
and  indivisible  units  of  duration  succeeding  one  another  discontinuously  :  each 
part  being  a  real  but  indivisible  duration,  so  that  besides  the  parts  that  are 
past  and  future,  the  present  is  also  a/#r/,  which  is — like  an  instant  of  time — 
indivisible,  but  which  is  also — unlike  an  instant  of  time — a  real  duration.  The 
former  kind  of  successive  duration  they  ascribe  to  corporeal,  corruptible 
creatures  ;  the  latter  to  spiritual,  incorruptible  creatures.  This  view  is  de- 
fended with  much  force  and  ingenuity  by  De  San  in  his  Cosmo logia  ;  J  where 
also  a  full  discussion  of  most  of  the  other  questions  we  have  touched  upon 
will  be  found. 

JPP- 517-57. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

RELATION;   THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE. 

87.  IMPORTANCE  OF  THE  PRESENT  CATEGORY.— An  analysis 
of  the  concept  of  Relation  will  be  found  to  have  a  very  direct 
bearing  both  on  the  Theory  of  Being  and  on  the  Theory  of 
Knowledge.  For  the  human  mind  knowledge  is  embodied  in  the 
mental  act  of  judgment,  and  this  is  an  act  of  comparison,  an  act 
whereby  we  relate  or  refer  one  concept  to  another.  The  act  of 
cognition  itself  involves  a  relation  between  the  knowing  subject 
and  the  known  object,  between  the  mind  and  reality.  Reality 
itself  is  understood  only  by  our  mentally  recognizing  or  establish- 
ing relations  between  the  objects  which  make  up  for  us  the  whole 
knowable  universe.  This  universe  we  apprehend  not  as  a  multi- 
tude of  isolated,  unconnected  individuals,  but  as  an  ordered  whole 
whose  parts  are  inter-related  by  their  mutual  co-ordinations  and 
subordinations.  The  order  we  apprehend  in  the  universe  results 
from  these  various  inter-relations  whereby  we  apprehend  it 
as  a  system.  What  we  call  a  law  of  nature,  for  instance,  is 
nothing  more  or  less  than  the  expression  of  some  constant  re- 
lation which  we  believe  to  exist  between  certain  parts  of  this 
system.  The  study  of  Relation,  therefore,  belongs  not  merely  to 
Logic  or  the  Theory  of  Knowledge,  but  also  to  the  Theory  of 
Being,  to  Metaphysics.  What,  then,  is  a  relation  ?  What  is 
the  object  of  this  mental  concept  which  we  express  by  the  term 
relation?  Are  there  in  the  known  and  knowable  universe  of 
our  experience  real  relations  ?  Or  are  all  relations  merely  logical, 
pure  creations  of  our  cognitive  activity  ?  Can  we  classify  rela- 
tions, whether  real  or  logical  ?  What  constitutes  a  relation  form- 
ally ?  What  are  the  properties  or  characteristics  of  relations  ? 
These  are  some  of  the  questions  we  must  attempt  to  answer. 

Again,  there  is  much  ambiguity,  and  not  a  little  error,  in 
the  use  of  the  terms  "  absolute  "  and  "  relative  "  in  modern 
philosophy.  To  some  of  these  sources  of  confusion  we  have 
referred  already  (5).  It  is  a  commonplace  of  modern  philosophy, 
a  thing  accepted  as  unquestioned  and  unquestionable,  that  we 

332 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     333 

know,  and  can  know,  only  the  relative.  There  is  a  true  sense  in 
this,  but  the  true  sense  is  not  the  generally  accepted  one. 

Considering  the  order  in  which  our  knowledge  of  reality  pro- 
gresses it  is  unquestionable  that  we  first  simply  perceive  "  things  " 
successively,  things  more  or  less  similar  or  dissimilar,  without 
realizing  in  what  they  agree  or  differ.  To  realize  the  latter  in- 
volves reflection  and  comparison.  Similarly  we  perceive  "  events  " 
in  succession,  events  some  of  which  depend  on  others,  but  without 
at  first  noting  or  realizing  this  dependence.  In  other  words  we 
apprehend  at  first  apart  from  their  relations,  or  as  absolute,  things 
and  events  which  are  really  relative  ;  and  we  do  so  spontaneously, 
without  realizing  even  that  we  perceive  them  as  absolute. 

The  seed  needs  soil  and  rain  and  sunshine  for  its  growth  ; 
but  these  do  not  need  the  seed.  The  turbine  needs  the  water, 
but  the  water  does  not  need  the  turbine.  When  we  realize  such 
facts  as  these,  by  reflection,  contrasting  what  is  dependent  with 
what  is  independent,  what  is  like  or  unlike,  before  or  after,  greater 
or  less  than,  other  things,  with  what  each  of  these  is  in  itself, 
we  come  into  conscious  possession  of  the  notion  of  "  the  relative  " 
and  oppose  this  to  the  notion  of  "  the  absolute". 

What  we  conceive  as  dependent  we  conceive  as  relative  ;  what 
we  conceive,  by  negation,  as  independent,  we  conceive  as  absolute. 
Then  by  further  observation  and  reflection  we  gradually  realize 
that  what  we  apprehended  as  independent  of  certain  things  is 
dependent  on  certain  other  things ;  that  the  same  thing  may  be 
independent  in  some  respects  and  dependent  in  other  respects. 
The  rain  does  not  depend  on  the  seed  which  it  causes  to  germin- 
ate, but  it  does  depend  on  the  clouds.  The  water  which  turns 
the  turbine  does  not  depend  on  the  turbine,  but  it  does  depend 
on  the  rain  ;  and  the  rain  depends  on  the  evaporation  of  the 
waters  of  the  ocean ;  and  the  evaporation  on  the  solar  heat ; 
and  this  again  on  chemical  and  physical  processes  in  the  sun  ; 
and  so  on,  as  far  as  sense  experience  will  carry  us :  until  we 
realize  that  everything  which  falls  directly  within  this  sense 
experience  is  dependent  and  therefore  relative.  Similarly,  the 
accident  of  quantity,  in  virtue  of  which  we  pronounce  one  of 
two  bodies  to  be  larger  than  the  other,  is  something  absolute  as 
compared  with  this  relation  itself;  but  as  compared  with  the 
substance  in  which  it  inheres,  it  is  dependent  on  the  latter,  or 
relative  to  the  latter,  while  the  substance  is  absolute,  or  free  from 
dependence  on  it.  But  if  substance  is  absolute  as  compared 


334  ONTOLOGY 

with  accident,  in  the  sense  that  substance  is  not  dependent  on  a 
subject  in  which  to  inhere,  but  exists  in  itself,  it  is  not  absolute 
in  the  sense  understood  by  Spinoza,  in  the  sense  of  existing 
of  itself,  independently  of  any  efficient  cause  to  account  for  its 
origin  (64).  All  the  substances  in  the  universe  of  our  direct 
sense  experience  are  contingent,  dependent  ab  alio,  and  there- 
fore in  this  sense  relative,  not  absolute. 

This  is  the  true  sense  in  which  relativity  is  an  essential  note 
of  the  reality  of  all  the  data  of  the  world  of  our  sense  experience. 
They  are  all  contingent,  or  relative,  or  conditioned  existences. 
And,  as  Kant  rightly  taught,  this  experience  forces  us  inevitably 
to  think  of  a  Necessary,  Absolute,  Unconditioned  Being,  on  whom 
these  all  depend.  But,  as  can  be  proved  in  Natural  Theology 
against  Kant,  this  concept  is  not  a  mere  regulative  idea  of  the 
reason,  a  form  of  thought  whereby  we  systematize  our  experi- 
ence :  it  is  a  concept  the  object  of  which  is  not  merely  a  necessity 
of  thought  but  also  an  objectively  existing  reality.1 

But  in  the  thought  of  most  modern  philosophers  relativism,  or  the 
doctrine  that  "  we  can  know  only  the  relative,"  is  something  very  different 
from  all  this.  For  positivists,  disciples  of  Auguste  Comte  (1798-1857),  it 
means  that  we  can  know  only  the  phenomena  which  fall  under  the  notice  of 
our  senses,  and  the  laws  of  resemblance,  succession,  etc.,  according  to  which 
they  occur.  All  "  theological  "  quests  for  supra-mundane  causes  and  reasons 
of  these  events,  and  all  "  metaphysical "  quests  for  suprasensible  forces, 
powers,  influences,  in  the  events  themselves,  as  explaining  or  accounting  for 
these  latter,  are  according  to  this  theory  necessarily  futile  :  the  mind  must 
rest  content  with  a  knowledge  of  the  positive  facts  of  sense,  and  their 
relations.  Relativism  is  thus  another  name  for  Positivism. 

For  the  psychological  sensism  of  English  philosophers  from  Hobbes 
[1588-1679]  and  Locke  [1632-1704]  down  to  Mill  [1806-73]  and  Bain 
[1818-1903]  relativism  means  that  all  conscious  cognition — which  they  tend 
to  reduce  to  modes  and  complexes  of  sensation — must  be,  and  can  only  be,  a 
cognition  of  the  changing,  the  transitional,  the  relative.2  According  to  an 
extreme  form  of  this  theory  the  mind  can  apprehend  only  relations,  but  not 
the  terms  of  any  of  these  relations  :  it  can  apprehend  nothing  as  absolute. 
Moreover  the  relations  which  it  apprehends  it  creates  itself.  Thus  all  reality 
is  reduced  to  a  system  of  relations.  For  Mill  the  supreme  category  of  real 
being  was  Sensation :  but  sensation  can  be  only  a  feeling  of  a  relation  : 
thus  the  supreme  category  of  real  being  would  be  Relation? 

*  Invisibilia  enim  ipsius  a  creatura  tnundi,  per  ea  quae  facia  sunt  intellecta, 
conspiciuntur,  sempiterna  quoque  ejus  virtus  et  divinitas,  ita  ut  [qui  veritatem  Dei 
in  injustitia  detinent]  sint  inexcusabiles. — Rom.  ii.  2o[i8]. 

3  C/.  MAKER,  Psychology  (4th  edit.),  pp.  90-2. 

3  For  a  clear  and  trenchant  criticism  of  modern  relativist  theories,  cf.  VEITCH, 
Knowing  and  Being,  especially  ch.  iv.,  "  Relation,"  pp.  129  sqq. 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     335 

But  the  main  current  of  relativism  is  that  which  has  issued  from  Kant's 
philosophy  and  worked  itself  out  in  various  currents  such  as  Spencer's 
Agnosticism,  Hegel's  Monism,  and  Renouvier's  Neo- criticism.1  The  mind 
can  know  only  what  is  related  to  it,  what  is  present  to  it,  what  is  in  it ;  not 
what  is  apart  from  it,  distinct  from  it.  The  mind  cannot  know  the  real 
nature  of  the  extramental,  nor  even  if  there  be  an  extramental  real.  Subject 
and  object  in  knowledge  are  really  one :  individual  minds  are  only  self- 
conscious  phases  in  the  ever-evolving  reality  of  the  One  Sole  Actual 
Being. 

These  are  but  a  few  of  the  erroneous  currents  of  modern  relativism.  A 
detailed  analysis  of  them  belongs  to  the  Theory  of  Knowledge.  But  it  may 
be  pointed  out  here  that  they  are  erroneous  because  they  have  distorted  and 
exaggerated  certain  profound  truths  concerning  the  scope  and  limits  of 
human  knowledge. 

It  is  true  that  we  have  no  positive,  proper,  intuitive  knowledge  of  the 
Absolute  Being  who  is  the  First  Cause  and  Last  End  of  the  universe  ;  that 
all  our  knowledge  of  the  nature  and  attributes  of  the  Infinite  Being  is 
negative,  analogical,  abstractive.  In  a  certain  sense,  therefore,  He  is  above 
the  scope  of  our  faculties ;  He  is  Incomprehensible.  But  it  is  false  to  say 
that  He  is  Unknowable  ;  that  our  knowledge  of  Him,  inadequate  and  im- 
perfect as  it  is,  is  not  genuine,  real,  and  instructive,  as  far  as  it  goes. 

Again,  a  distinct  knowledge  of  any  object  implies  defining,  limiting, 
distinguishing,  comparing,  relating,  judging  ;  analysing  and  synthesizing. 
It  implies  therefore  that  we  apprehend  things  in  relations  with  other  things. 
But  this  supposes  an  antecedent,  if  indistinct,  apprehension  of  the  "  things  " 
themselves.  Indeed  we  cannot  help  pronouncing  as  simply  unintelligible  the 
contention  that  all  knowledge  is  of  relations,  and  that  we  can  have  no 
knowledge  of  things  as  absolute.  How  could  we  become  aware  of  relations 
without  being  aware  of  the  terms  related  ?  Spencer  himself  admits  that  the 
very  reasoning  whereby  we  establish  the  "  relativity  of  knowledge  "  leads  us 
inevitably  to  assert  as  necessary  the  existence  of  the  non-relative,  the 
Absolute  : 2  a  necessity  which  Kant  also  recognizes. 

Finally,  the  fact  that  reality,  in  order  to  be  known,  must  be  present  to 
the  knowing  mind — or,  in  other  words,  that  knowledge  itself  is  a  relation 
between  object  and  subject — in  no  way  justifies  the  conclusion  that  we 
cannot  know  the  real  nature  of  things  as  they  are  in  themselves,  absolutely, 
but  only  our  own  subjective,  mental  impressions  or  representations  of  the 
absolute  reality,  in  itself  unknowable.3  The  obvious  fact  that  any  reality 
in  order  to  be  known  must  be  related  to  the  knowing  mind,  seems  to  be 
regarded  by  some  philosophers  as  if  it  were  a  momentous  discovery.  Then, 
conceiving  the  "thing-in-itself,"  the  absolute,  as  a  something  standing  out 
of  all  relation  to  mind,  they  declare  solemnly  that  we  cannot  know  the 
absolute  :  a  declaration  which  may  be  interpreted  either  as  a  mere  truism — 
that  we  cannot  know  a  thing  without  knowing  it ! — or  as  a  purely  gratuitous 
assertion,  that  besides  the  world  of  realities  which  reveal  themselves  to  our 
minds  there  is  another  world  of  unattained  and  unattainable  "things-in- 

1  Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §§  179-80. 

2  Principles  of  Psychology,  P.  ii.,  ch.  Hi.,  §  88, 

3  Cf.  MAKER,  Psychology,  pp.  157-9. 


336  ONTOLOGY 

themselves "  which  are  as  it  were  the  real  realities  !  These  philosophers 
have  yet  to  show  that  there  is  anything  absurd  or  impossible  in  the  view 
that  there  is  simply  one  world  of  realities — realities  which  exist  absolutely  in 
themselves  apart  from  our  apprehension  of  them  and  which  in  the  process 
of  cognition  come  into  relation  with  our  minds.1  Moreover,  if  besides  this 
world  of  known  and  knowable  realities  there  were  such  a  world  of  "  trans- 
cendental "  things-in-themselves  as  these  philosophers  discourse  of,  such  a 
world  would  have  very  little  concern  for  us,2  since  by  definition  and  ex 
hypothesi  it  would  be  for  us  necessarily  as  if  it  were  not :  indeed  the 
hypothesis  of  such  a  transcendental  world  is  self-contradictory,  for  even  did 
it  exist  we  could  not  think  of  it. 

The  process  of  cognition  has  indeed  its  difficulties  and  mysteries.  To 
examine  these,  to  account  for  the  possibility  of  truth  and  error,  to  analyse 
the  grounds  and  define  the  scope  and  limits  of  human  certitude,  are  problems 
for  the  Theory  of  Knowledge^  on  the  domain  of  which  we  are  trenching 
perhaps  too  far  already  in  the  present  context.  But  at  all  events  to  conceive 
reality  as  absolute  in  the  sense  of  being  totally  unrelated  to  mind,  and  then 
to  ask  :  Is  reality  so  transformed  in  the  very  process  of  cognition  that  the 
mind  cannot  possibly  apprehend  it  or  represent  it  as  it  really  is  ? — this  certainly 
is  to  misconceive  and  mis-state  in  a  hopeless  fashion  the  main  problem  of 
Epistemology. 

88.  ANALYSIS  OF  THE  CONCEPT  OF  RELATION. — Relation  is 
one  of  those  ultimate  concepts  which  does  not  admit  of  defini- 
tion proper.  And  like  other  ultimate  concepts  it  is  familiar  to 
all.  Two  lines,  each  measuring  a  yard,  are  equal  to  each  other 
in  length :  equality  is  a  quantitative  relation.  The  number  2 
is  half  of  4,  and  4  is  twice  2  :  half  and  double  express  each  a 
quantitative  relation  of  inequality.  If  two  twin  brothers  are  like 
each  other  we  have  the  qualitative  relation  of  resemblance  or 
similarity  ;  if  a  negro  and  a  European  are  unlike  each  other  we 
have  the  qualitative  relation  of  dissimilarity.  The  steam  of  the 
locomotive  moves  the  train  :  a  relation  of  efficient  causality,  of 
efficient  cause  to  effect.  The  human  eye  is  adapted  to  the 

1 "  We  cannot  of  course  perceive  an  unperceived  world,  nor  can  we  conceive  a 
world  the  conception  of  which  is  not  in  the  mind ;  but  there  is  no  contradiction  or 
absurdity  in  the  proposition  :  '  A  material  world  of  three  dimensions  has  existed  for 
a  time  unperceived  and  unthought  of  by  any  created  being,  and  then  revealed 
itself  to  human  minds'." — MAKER,  Psychology,  p.  in,  n. 

2"I  do  not  pretend  to  demonstrate  anything,  nor  do  I  feel  much  concern, 
about  any  unknowable  noumenon  which  never  reveals  itself  in  my  consciousness. 
If  there  be  in  existence  an  inscrutable  '  transcendental  Ego,'  eternally  screened 
from  my  ken  by  this  self-asserting  '  empirical  Ego,'  I  confess  I  feel  very  little 
interest  in  the  nature  or  the  welfare  of  the  former.  The  only  soul  about  which  I 
care  is  that  which  immediately  presents  itself  in  its  acts,  which  thinks,  wills, 
remembers,  believes,  loves,  repents,  and  hopes.11 — MAKER,  op.  cit.,  p.  475.  Cf. 
MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  180,  pp.  363. 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     337 

function  of  seeing  :  a  relation  of  purpose  or  finality  ',  of  means  to 
end.  And  so  on. 

The  objective  concept  of  relation  thus  establishes  a  conceptual 
unity  between  a  pair  of  things  in  the  domain  of  some  other 
category.  Like  quantity,  quality,  actio  andflassio,  etc.,  it  is  an 
ultimate  mode  of  reality  as  apprehended  through  human  ex- 
perience. But  while  the  reality  of  the  other  accident-categories 
appertains  to  substances  considered  absolutely  or  in  isolation 
from  one  another,  the  reality  of  this  category  which  we  call 
relation  appertains  indivisibly  to  two  (or  more)  together,  so  that 
when  one  of  these  is  taken  or  considered  apart  from  the  other 
(or  others)  the  relation  formally  disappears.  Each  of  the  other 
(absolute)  accidents  is  formally  "  something"  (^'  aliquid"  ;  "rt"), 
whereas  the  formal  function  of  relation  is  to  refer  something  "  to 
something"  else  ("  ad  aliquid"  ;  "777)05  74").  The  other  acci- 
dents formally  inhere  in  a  subject,  "  habent  esse  in  subjecto  "  ; 
relation,  considered  formally  as  such,  does  not  inhere  in  a 
subject,  but  gives  the  latter  a  respect,  or  bearing,  or  reference,  or 
ordination,  to  or  towards  something  else  :  "  relatio  dat  subjecto 
respectum  vel  esse  ad  aliquid  aliud  ".  The  length  of  each  of  two 
lines  is  an  absolute  accident  of  that  line,  but  the  relation  of 
equality  or  inequality  is  intelligible  only  of  both  together. 
Destroy  one  line  and  the  relation  is  destroyed,  though  the  other 
line  retains  its  length  absolutely  and  unaltered.  And  so  of  the 
other  examples  just  given.  Relation,  then,  considered  formally 
as  such,  is  not  an  absolute  accident  inhering  in  a  subject,  but  is 
a  reference  of  this  subject  to  some  other  thing,  this  latter  being 
called  the  term  of  the  relation.  Hence  relation  is  described  by 
the  scholastics  as  the  ordination  or  respect  or  reference  of  one  thing 
to  another  :  ordo  vel  respectus  vel  habitudo  unius  ad  aliud.  The 
relation  of  a  subject  to  something  else  as  term  is  formally  not 
anything  absolute,  "  aliquid"  in  that  subject,  but  merely  refers 
this  subject  to  something  else  as  term,  "  ad  aliquid  ".  Hence 
Aristotle's  designation  of  relation  as  "  777)05  ™,"  "  ad  aliquid"  "to 
or  towards  something".  "We  conceive  as  relations  [777)05  n]," 
he  says,  "those  things  whose  very  entity  itself  we  regard  as 
being  somehow  Bother  things  or  to  another  thing."  * 

To  constitute  a  relation  of  whatsoever  kind,  three  elements 
or  factors  are  essential  :  the  two  extremes  of  the  relation,  viz.  the 


1  Up6s   TI  Se  rck  roiavra  \eyerai,  8<ra    avrd,  chrep  f<rrlv,  fTfpwv  eTj>cu   Aeyerat, 
fauffovv  &\\ws  irpbs  erepov.  —  Categ.  v.  I. 

22 


338  ONTOLOGY 

subject  of  the  relation  and  the  term  to  which  the  subject  is 
referred,  and  what  is  called  the  foundation,  or  basis,  or  ground, 
or  reason,  of  the  relation  (fundamentum  relationis).  This  latter 
is  the  cause  or  reason  on  account  of  which  the  subject  bears  the 
relation  to  its  term.  It  is  always  something  absolute,  in  the 
extremes  of  the  relation.  Hence  it  follows  that  we  may  regard 
any  relation  in  two  ways,  either  formally  as  the  actual  bond  or 
link  of  connexion  between  the  extremes,  or  fundamentally,  i.e. 
as  in  its  cause  or  foundation  in  these  extremes.  This  is  expressed 
technically  by  distinguishing  between  the  relation  secundum  esse 
in  and  secundum  esse  ad,  i.e.  between  the  absolute  entity  of  its 
foundation  in  the  subject  and  the  purely  relative  entity  in  which 
the  relation  itself  formally  consists.  Needless  to  say,  the  latter, 
whatever  it  is,  does  not  add  any  absolute  entity  to  that  of  either 
extreme.  But  in  what  does  this  relative  entity  itself  consist? 
Before  attempting  an  answer  to  this  question  we  must  endeavour 
to  distinguish,  in  the  next  section  (89),  between  purely  logical 
relations  and  relations  which  are  in  some  true  sense  real.  Here 
we  may  note  certain  corollaries  from  the  concept  of  relation  as 
just  analysed. 

Realities  of  which  the  objective  concept  of  relation  is  verified 
derive  from  this  latter  certain  properties  or  special  characteristics. 
The  first  of  these  is  reciprocity :  two  related  extremes  are  as 
such  intelligible  only  in  reference  to  each  other :  father  to  son, 
half  to  double,  like  to  like,  etc.,  and  vice  versa:  Correlativa  se 
invicem  connotant.  The  second  is  that  things  related  to  one 
another  are  collateral  or  concomitant  in  nature :  Correlativa  sunt 
simul  natura:  neither  related  extreme  is  as  such  naturally 
prior  to  the  other.  This  is  to  be  understood  of  the  relation 
only  in  its  formal  aspect,  not  fundamentally.  Fundamentally 
or  materialiter,  the  cause  for  instance  is  naturally  prior  to  its 
effect.  The  third  is  that  related  things  are  concomitant 
logically,  or  in  the  order  of  knowledge :  Correlativa  sunt  simul 
cognitione:  a  reality  can  be  known  and  defined  as  relative  to 
another  reality  only  by  the  simultaneous  cognition  of  both 
extremes  of  the  relation. 

89.  LOGICAL  RELATIONS. — Logical  relations  are  those  which 
are  created  by  our  own  thought,  and  which  can  have  no  being  other 
than  the  being  which  they  have  in  and  for  our  thought.  That  there  are 
such  relations,  which  are  the  exclusive  product  of  our  thought-ac- 
tivity, is  universally  admitted.  The  mind  can  reflect  on  its  own 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE    339 

direct  concepts  ;  it  can  compare  and  co-ordinate  and  subordinate 
them  among  themselves  ;  it  thus  forms  ideas  of  relations  between 
those  concepts,  ideas  which  the  scholastics  call  reflex  or  logical  ideas, 
or  * '  secunda  intentiones  mentis  ".  These  relations  are  entia  ratioms, 
purely  logical  relations.  Such,  for  instance,  are  the  relations  of 
genus  to  species,  of  predicate  to  subject,  the  relations  described  in 
Logic  as  the  pr&dicabilia.  Moreover  we  can  compare  our  direct 
universal  concepts  with  the  individual  realities  they  represent,  and 
see  that  this  feature  or  mode  of  universality  in  the  concept,  its 
"  intentio  universalitatis"  is  a  logical  relation  of  the  concept  to  the 
reality  which  it  represents  :  a  logical  relation,  inasmuch  as  its  sub- 
ject (the  concept)  and  its  foundation  (the  abstractness  of  the  con- 
cept) are  in  themselves  pure  products  of  our  thought-activity. 
Furthermore,  we  are  forced  by  the  imperfection  of  the  thought-pro- 
cesses whereby  we  apprehend  reality — conception  of  abstract  ideas, 
limitation  of  concepts  in  extension  and  intension,  affirmation  and 
negation,  etc. — to  apprehend  conceptual  limitations,  negations, 
comparisons,  etc.,  in  a  word,  all  logical  entities,  as  if  they  were 
realities,  or  after  the  manner  of  realities,  i.e.  to  conceive  what  is 
really  "  nothing"  as  if  it  were  really  "  something,"  to  conceive  the 
non-ens  as  if  it  were  an  ens,  to  conceive  it  per  modum  entis  (3). 
And  when  we  compare  these  logical  entities  with  one  another,  or 
with  real  entities,  the  relations  thus  established  by  our  thought 
are  all  logical  relations.  Finally,  it  follows  from  this  same  imper- 
fection in  our  human  modes  of  thought  that  we  sometimes 
understand  things  only  by  attributing  to  these  certain  logical 
relations,  i.e.  relations  which  affect  not  the  reality  of  these  things, 
their  esse  reale,  but  only  the  mode  of  their  presence  in  our  minds, 
their  esse  ideale  (4). 

In  view  of  the  distinction  between  logical  relations  and  those  we  shall 
presently  describe  as  real  relations,  and  especially  in  view  of  the  prevalent 
tendency  in  modern  philosophy  to  regard  all  relations  as  merely  logical,  it 
would  be  desirable  to  classify  logical  relations  and  to  indicate  the  ways  in 
which  they  are  created  by,  or  result  from,  our  thought-processes.  We  know 
of  no  more  satisfactory  analysis  than  that  accomplished  by  St.  Thomas  Aquinas 
in  various  parts  of  his  many  monumental  and  enduring  works.  In  his  Com- 
mentaries on  the  Sentences 1  he  enumerates  four  ways  in  which  logical  re- 
lations arise  from  our  thought-processes.  In  his  Quaestiones  Disputatae  a 

1 1  Sentent.,  Dist.  xxvi.,  q.  2,  art.  i. 

2  "  Sicut  realis  relatio  consistit  in  ordine  rei  ad  rem,  ita  relatio  rationis  consistit 
in  ordine  intellectuum  [ordination  of  concepts] ;  quod  quidem  dupliciter  potest  con- 
tingere.  Uno  modo  secundum  quod  iste  ordo  est  adinventus  per  intellectum,  et  at- 
tributus  ei,  quod  relative  dicitur  ;  et  hujusmodi  sunt  relationes  quae  attribuuntur  ab 


340  ONTOLOGY 

he  reduces  these  to  two  :  some  logical  relations,  he  says,  are  invented  by  the 
intellect  reflecting  on  its  own  concepts  and  are  attributed  to  these  concepts  ; 
others  arise  from  the  fact  that  the  intellect  can  understand  things  only  by 
relating,  grouping,  classifying  them,  only  by  introducing  among  them  an 
arrangement  or  system  of  relations •,  through  which  alone  it  can  under- 
stand them,  relations  which  it  could  only  erroneously  ascribe  to  these 
things  as  they  really  exist,  since  they  are  only  projected,  as  it  were,  into 
these  things  by  the  mind.  Thus,  though  it  consciously  thinks  of  these 
things  as  so  related,  it  deliberately  abstains  from  asserting  that  these 
relations  really  affect  the  things  themselves.  Now  the  mistake  of  all 
those  philosophers,  whether  ancient,  medieval  or  modern,  who  deny  that 
any  relations  are  real,  seems  to  be  that  they  carry  this  abstention  too  far. 
They  contend  that  all  relations  are  simply  read  into  the  reality  by  our  thought ; 
that  none  are  in  the  reality  in  any  true  sense  independently  of  our  thought.  They 
thus  exaggerate  the  role  of  thought  as  a  constitutive  factor  of  known  or  ex- 
perienced reality  ;  and  they  often  do  so  to  such  a  degree  that  according  to 
their  philosophy  human  thought  not  merely  discovers  or  knows  reality  but 
practically  constitutes  or  creates  it :  or  at  all  events  to  such  a  degree  that 
cognition  would  be  mainly  a  process  whereby  reality  is  assimilated  to  mind  and 
not  rather  a  process  whereby  mind  is  assimilated  to  reality.  Against  all  such 

intellects  rebus  intellects,  prout  suntintellectae,  sicut  relatio  generis  et  speciei ;  has 
enim  relationes  ratio  adinvenit  consider ando  ordinem  ejus,  quod  est  in  intellectu  ad 
res,  quae  sunt  extra,  vel  etiam  ordinem  intellectuum  ad  invicem.  Alio  modo  secun- 
dum  quod  hujusmodi  relationes  consequuntur  modum  intelligendi,  videlicet  quod  in- 
tellectus  intelligit  aliquidin  ordine  ad  aliud  ;  licet  ilium  ordinem  intellectus  non  adin- 
veniat,  sed  magis  ex  quadam  necessitate  consequatur  modum  intelligendi.  Et 
hujusmodi  relationes  intellectus  non  attribuit  ei,  quod  est  in  intellectu,  sed  ei,  quod 
est  in  re.  Et  hoc  quidem  contingit  secundum  quod  aliqua  non  habentia  secundum 
se  ordinem,  ordinate  intelliguntur  ;  licet  intellectus  non  intelligit  ea  habere  ordinem, 
quia  sic  esset  falsus.  Ad  hoc  autem  quod  aliqua  habeant  ordinem,  oportet  quod 
utrumque  sit  ens,  et  utrumque  ordinabile  ad  aliud.  Quandoque  autem  intellectus  ac- 
cipit  aliqua  duo  ut  entia,  quorum  alterum  tantum  vel  neutrum  est  ens  ;  sicut  cum 
accipit  duo  futura,  vel  unum  praesens  et  aliud  futurum,  et  intelligiti  unum  cum  ordine 
ad  aliud,  dicit  alterum  esse  prius  altero  ;  unde  istae  relationes  sunt  rationis  tantum, 
utpote  modum  intelligendi  consequentes.  Quandoque  vero  accipit  unum  ut  duo,  et 
intelligit  ea  cum  quodam  ordine  ;  sicut  cum  dicitur  aliquid  esse  idem  sibi :  et  sic  talis 
relatio  est  rationis  tantum.  Quandoque  vero  accipit  aliqua  duo  ut  ordinabilia  ad 
invicem,  inter  quae  non  est  ordo  medius,  immo  alterum  ipsorum  essentialiter  est  ordo  ; 
sicut  cum  dicit  relationem  accidere  subjecto ;  unde  talis  relatio  relationis  ad  quod- 
cumque  aliud  est  rationis  tantum.  Quandoque  vero  accipit  aliquid  cum  ordine  ad 
aliud,  inquantum  est  terminus  ordinis  alterius  ad  ipsum,  licet  ipsum  non  ordinetur  ad 
aliud :  sicut  accipiendo  scibile  ut  terminum  ordinis  scientiae  ad  ipsum." — De  Potentia, 
q.  vii.,  art.  n  ;  cf.  ibid.  art.  10. 

"  Cum  relatio  requirit  duo  extrema,  tripliciter  se  habet  ad  hoc  quod  sit  res 
naturae  aut  rationis.  Quandoque  enim  ex  utraque  parte  est  res  rationis  tantum, 
quando  scilicet  ordo  vel  habitudo  non  potest  esse  inter  aliqua  nisi  secundum  appre- 
hensionem  intellectus  tantum,  utpote  cum  dicimus  idem  eidem  idem.  Nam  secundum 
quod  ratio  apprehendit  bis  aliquod  unum  statuit  illud  ut  duo ;  et  sic  apprehendit 
quandam  habitudinem  ipsius  ad  seipsum.  Et  similiter  est  de  omnibus  relationibus 
quae  sunt  inter  ens  et  non  ens,  quas  format  ratio,  inquantum  apprehendit  non  ens 
ut  quoddam  extremum.  Et  idem  est  de  omnibus  relationibus  quae  consequuntur  actum 
rationis,  ut  genus,  species,  et  hujusmodi.  .  .  ," — Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  xiii.,  art.  7. 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE    341 

idealist  tendencies  in  philosophy  we  assert  that  not  all  relations  are  logical, 
that  there  are  some  relations  which  are  not  mere  products  of  thought,  but 
which  are  themselves  real. 

90  REAL  RELATIONS  ;  THEIR  EXISTENCE  VINDICATED. — A 
real  relation  is  one  which  is  not  a  mere  product  of  thought,  but 
which  obtains  between  real  things  independently  of  our  thought. 
For  a  real  relation  there  must  be  (<z)a  real,  individual  subject ;  (b) 
a  real  foundation ;  and  (c)  a  real,  individual  term,  really  distinct 
from  the  subject.  If  the  subject  of  the  relation,  or  its  foundation, 
be  not  real,  but  a  mere  ens  rationis,  obviously  the  relation  cannot 
be  more  than  logical.  If,  moreover,  the  term  be  not  a  really  dis- 
tinct entity  from  the  subject,  then  the  relation  can  be  nothing 
more  than  a  mental  comparison  of  some  thing  with  itself,  either 
under  the  same  aspect  or  under  mentally  distinct  aspects.  A  re- 
lation is  real  in  the  fullest  sense  when  the  extremes  are  mutually 
related  in  virtue  of  a  foundation  really  existing  in  both.  Hence 
St.  Thomas'  definition  of  a  real  relation  as  a  connexion  between  some 
two  things  in  virtue  of  something  really  found  in  both  :  habitudo 
inter  aliqua  duo  secundum  aliquid  realiter  conveniens  utrique}* 

Now  the  question :  Are  there  in  the  real  world,  among  the 
things  which  make  up  the  universe  of  our  experience,  relations 
which  are  not  merely  logical,  which  are  not  a  mere  product  of  our 
thought  ? — can  admit  of  only  one  reasonable  answer.  That  there 
are  relations  which  are  in  some  true  sense  real  and  independ- 
ent of  our  thought-activity  must  be  apparent  to  everyone  whose 
mental  outlook  on  things  has  not  been  warped  by  the  specious 
sophistries  of  some  form  or  other  of  Subjective  Idealism.  For  ex 
professo  refutations  of  Idealist  theories  the  student  must  consult 
treatises  on  the  Theory  of  Knowledge.  A  few  considerations  on 
the  present  point  will  be  sufficently  convincing  here. 

First,  then,  let  us  appeal  to  the  familiar  examples  mentioned 
above.  Are  not  two  lines,  each  a  yard  long,  really  equal  in 
length,  whether  we  know  it  or  not?  Is  not  a  line  a  yard  long 
really  greater  than  another  line  a  foot  in  length,  whether  we 
know  it  or  not  ?  Surely  our  thought  does  not  create  but  discovers 

1  Summa  TheoL,  i.  q.  xiii.  art.  7.  Elsewhere  he  points  the  distinction  in  these 
terms  :  "  Respectus  ad  aliud  aliquando  est  in  ipsa  natura  rerum,  utpote  quando  aliquae 
res  secundum  suam  naturam  ad  invicem  ordinataesunt,  etad  invicem  inclinationem 
habent ;  et  hujusmodi  relationes  oportet  esse  reales.  .  .  .  Aliquando  vero  respectus 
significatus  per  ea,  quae  dicuntur  Ad  aliquid,  est  tantum  in  ipsa  apprehensione 
rationis  conferentis  unum  alteri ;  et  tune  est  relatio  rationis  tantum,  sicut  cum  com- 
parat  ratio  hominem  animali,  ut  specjein  ad  genus."— ibid.,  cj.  xxviii.,  art.  i, 


342  ONTOLOGY 

the  equality  or  inequality.  The  twin  brothers  really  resemble 
each  other,  even  when  no  one  is  thinking  of  this  resemblance ; 
the  resemblance  is  there  whether  anyone  adverts  to  it  or  not. 
The  motion  of  the  train  really  depends  on  the  force  of  the  steam ; 
it  is  not  our  thought  that  produces  this  relation  of  dependence. 
The  eye  is  really  so  constructed  as  to  perceive  light,  and  the 
light  is  really  such  by  nature  as  to  arouse  the  sensation  of  vision ; 
surely  it  is  riot  our  thought  that  produces  this  relation  of  mutual 
adaptation  in  these  realities.  Such  relations  are,  therefore,  in 
some  true  sense  real  and  independent  of  our  thought :  unless  indeed 
we  are  prepared  to  say  with  idealists  that  the  lines,  the  brothers, 
the  train,  the  steam,  the  eye,  and  the  light — in  a  word,  that  not 
merely  relations,  but  all  accidents  and  substances,  all  realities — 
are  mere  products  of  thought,  ideas,  states  of  consciousness. 

Again,  order  is  but  a  system  of  relations  of  co-ordination  and 
subordination  between  really  distinct  things.  But  there  is  real 
order  in  the  universe.  And  therefore  there  are  real  relations  in 
the  universe.  There  is  real  order  in  the  universe  :  In  the  physical 
universe  do  we  not  experience  a  real  subordination  of  effects  to 
causes,  a  real  adaptation  of  means  to  ends  ?  And  in  the  moral  uni- 
verse is  not  this  still  more  apparent  ?  The  domestic  society,  the 
family,  is  not  merely  an  aggregate  of  individuals  any  one  of  whom 
we  may  designate  indiscriminately  husband  or  wife,  father  or 
mother,  brother  or  sister.  These  relations  of  order  are  real ;  they 
are  obviously  not  the  product  of  our  thought,  not  produced  by 
it,  but  only  discovered,  apprehended  by  it. 

It  is  a  profound  truth  that  not  all  the  reality  of  the  universe 
which  presents  itself  to  the  human  mind  for  analysis  and  inter- 
pretation, not  all  the  reality  of  this  universe,  is  to  be  found  in  the 
mere  sum-total  of  the  individual  entities  that  constitute  it,  con- 
sidering these  entities  each  absolutely  and  in  isolation  from  the 
others.  Nor  does  all  its  real  perfection  consist  in  the  mere  sum- 
total  of  the  absolute  perfections  intrinsic  to,  and  inherent  in, 
those  various  individual  entities.  Over  and  above  these  individ- 
ual entities  and  their  absolute  perfections,  there  is  a  domain  of 
reality,  and  of  real  perfections,  consisting  in  the  real  adapta- 
tion, interaction,  interdependence,  arrangement,  co-ordination  and  sub- 
ordination, of  those  absolute  entities  and  perfections  among  them- 
selves. And  if  we  realize  this  profound  truth  *  we  shall  have  no 

1  St.  Thomas  gives  expression  to  it  in  these  sentences :  "  Perfectio  et  bonum 
quae  sunt  in  jebus  extra  animam,  non  solum  attendimtur  secundum  aliquid  absolute 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     343 

difficulty  in  recognizing  that,  while  the  thought-processes  where- 
by we  interpret  this  universe  produce  logical  relations  which  we 
utilize  in  this  interpretation,  there  is  also  in  this  universe  itself  a 
system  of  relations  which  are  real,  which  are  not  invented,  but 
are  merely  detected,  by  our  minds. 

According  to  idealists,  relation  is  a  subjective  category  of  the 
mind.  It  belongs  to  phenomena  only  on  the  introduction  of  the 
latter  into  the  understanding.  "  Laws  no  more  exist  in 
phenomena,"  writes  Kant,1  "  than  phenomena  exist  in  themselves ; 
the  former  are  relative  to  the  subject  in  which  the  phenomena 
inhere,  in  so  far  as  this  subject  is  endowed  with  understanding ; 
just  as  the  latter  are  relative  to  this  same  subject  in  so  far  as  it  is 
endowed  with  sensibility."  This  is  ambiguous  and  misleading. 
Of  course,  laws  or  any  other  relations  do  not  exist  for  us,  are 
not  known  by  us,  are  not  brought  into  relation  to  our  under  standing  > 
as  long  as  we  do  not  consciously  grasp  the  two  terms  and  the 
foundation  on  which  the  law,  or  any  other  relation,  rests.  But 
there  are  relations  whose  terms  and  foundations  are  anterior  to, 
and  independent  of,  our  thought,  and  which  consequently  are  not 
a  product  of  thought. 

"  Sensations,  or  other  feelings  being  given,"  writes  J.  S. 
Mill,2  "  succession  and  simultaneousness  are  the  two  conditions 
to  the  alternative  of  which  they  are  subjected  by  the  nature  of 
our  faculties."  But,  as  M.  Boirac  pertinently  asks,3  "why  do 
we  apply  in  any  particular  case  the  one  alternative  of  the  two- 
faced  category  rather  than  the  other  ?  Is  it  not  because  in  every 
case  the  concrete  application  made  by  our  faculties  is  determined 
by  the  objects  themselves,  by  an  objective  and  real  foundation  of 
the  relation  ?  " 

91.  MUTUAL  AND  MIXED  RELATIONS;  TRANSCENDENTAL 
RELATIONS. — There  are,  then,  relations  which  are  in  some  true 
sense  real.  But  in  what  does  the  reality  of  a  real  relation  con- 
sist ?  Before  answering  this  question  we  must  examine  the  main 
classes  of  real  relations. 

inhaerens  rebus,  sed  etiam  secundum  ordinem  unius  rei  ad  aliam ;  sicut  etiam  in 
ordine  partium  exercitus,  bonum  exercitus  consistit :  huic  enim  ordini  comparat 
Philosophus  [Aristot.,  xii.  (x.)  Metaph.,  Comment.  52  sqq.~\  ordinem  universi.  Oportet, 
ergo  in  ipsis  rebus  ordinem  quemdam  esse  ;  hie  autem  ordo  relatio  quaedam  est.  .  .  . 
Sic  ergo  oportet  quod  res  habentes  ordinem  ad  aliquid,  realiter  referantur  ad  ipsum, 
et  quod  in  eis  aliqua  res  sit  relatio." — QQ.  Disp.  De  Potentia,  q.  vii.,  art.  9. 

1  Kritik  der  reinen  Vernunft,  bk.  i.,  Hauptst.  ii.,  Abschn.  ii.,  §  26. 

2  Logic,  bk.  i.,  ch.  iii.,  §  10. 

*L'Idee  du  phenomene,  p.  181 — apud  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  173. 


344  ONTOLOGY 

We  have  already  referred  to  the  mutual  relation  as  one  which 
has  a  real  foundation  in  both  of  the  extremes,  such  as  the  relation 
between  father  and  son,  or  between  a  greater  and  a  lesser  quantity, 
or  between  two  equal  quantities,  or  between  two  similar  people.1 
Such  a  relation  is  called  a  relatio  aequiperantiae,  a  relation  of  the 
same  denomination,  if  it  has  the  same  name  on  both  sides,  as 
"equal — equal"  "similar — similar''  " friend— friend"  etc.  It  is 
called  a  relatio  disquiperantiae,  of  different  denomination,  if  it  has 
a  different  name,  indicating  a  different  kind  of  relation,  on  either 
side,  as  "father — son?  "cause — effect"  "master — servant?  etc. 

Distinct  from  this  is  the  non-mutual  or  mixed  relation,  which 
has  a  real  foundation  only  in  one  extreme,  so  that  the  relation  of 
this  to  the  other  extreme  is  real,  while  the  relation  of  the  latter 
to  the  former  is  only  logical.2  For  instance,  the  relation  of  every 
creature  to  the  Creator  is  a  real  relation,  for  the  essential  de- 
pendence of  the  creature  on  the  Creator  is  a  relation  grounded  in 
the  very  nature  of  the  creature  as  a  contingent  being.  But  the 
relation  of  the  Creator  to  the  creature  is  only  logical,  for  the 
creative  act  on  which  it  is  grounded  implies  in  the  Creator  no 
reality  distinct  from  His  substance,  which  substance  has  no 
necessary  relation  to  any  creature.  Similarly,  the  relation  of 
the  (finite)  knowing  mind  to  the  known  object  is  a  real  re- 
lation, for  it  is  grounded  in  a  new  quality,  viz.  knowledge,  where- 
by the  mind  is  perfected.  But  the  relation  of  the  object  to  the 
mind  is  not  a  real  relation,  for  by  becoming  actually  known  the 
object  itself  does  not  undergo  any  real  change  or  acquire  any  new 
reality  or  perfection.  We  have  seen  already  (42,  50)  that  all  reality 

1 "  Quaedam  veto  relationes  sunt  quantum  ad  utrumque  extremum  res  naturae, 
quando  scilicet  est  habitudo  inter  aliqua  duo  secundum  aliquid  realiter  conveniens 
utrique ;  sicut  patetde  omnibus  relationibus  quae  consequuntur  quantitatem,  ut  mag- 
num et  parvum,  duplum  et  dimidium,  et  hujusmodi ;  nam  quantitas  est  in  utroque  ex- 
tremorum  :  et  simile  est  de  relationibus  quae  consequuntur  actionem  et  paasionem, 
ut  motivum  et  mobile,  pater  et  filius,  et  similia." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q. 
xiii.,  art.  7. 

2  "  Quandoque  vero  relatio  in  uno  extremorum  est  res  naturae,  et  in  altero  est 
res  rationis  tantum  :  et  hoc  contingit  quandocunque  duo  extrema  non  sunt  unius 
ordinis ;  sicut  sensus  et  scientia  referuntur  ad  sensibile  et  scibile  ;  quae  quidem,  in- 
quantum  sunt  res  quaedam  in  esse  naturale  existentes,  sunt  extra  ordinem  esse 
sensibilis  et  intelligibilis.  Et  ideo  in  scientia  quidem  et  sensu  est  relatio  realis, 
inquantum  ordinantur  ad  sciendum  vel  sentiendum  res  ;  sed  res  ipsae  in 
se  consideratae  sunt  extra  ordinem  hujusmodi ;  unde  in  eis  non  est  aliqua  relatio 
realiter  ad  scientiam  et  sensum,  sed  secundum  rationem  tantum,  inquantum  intellectus 
apprehendit  ea  ut  terminos  relationum  scientiae  et  sensus.  Unde  Philosophus  dicit 
in  5  Metaph.,  text.  20,  quod  non  dicuntur  relative,  eo  quod  ipsa  referantur  ad  alia, 
sed  quia  alia  referantur  ad  ipsa." — ibid. 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     345 

has  a  transcendental  or  essential  relation  to  intellect  and  to  will, 
ontological  truth  and  ontological  goodness.  These  relations  of 
reality  to  the  Divine  Intellect  and  Will  are  formally  or  actually 
verified  in  all  things  ;  whereas  the  transcendental  truth  and  good- 
ness of  any  thing  in  regard  to  any  created  intellect  and  will  are 
formal  or  actual  only  when  that  thing  is  actually  known  and  willed 
by  such  created  faculties  :  the  relations  of  a  thing  to  a  mind  that 
does  not  actually  know  and  desire  that  thing  are  only  funda- 
mental or  potential  truth  and  goodness.  This  brings  us  to  a 
second  great  division  of  relations,  into  essential  or  transcendental 
and  accidental  or  predicamental. 

An  essential  or  transcendental  relation  is  one  which  is  involved 
in  the  very  essence  itself  of  the  related  thing.  It  enters  into  and 
is  inseparable  from  the  concept  of  the  latter.  Thus  in  the  con- 
cept of  the  creature  as  such  there  is  involved  an  essential  relation 
of  the  latter's  dependence  on  the  Creator.  So,  too,  every  individ- 
ual reality  involves  essential  relations  of  identity  with  itself  and 
distinction  from  other  things,  and  essential  relations  of  truth  and 
goodness  to  the  Divine  Mind  and  created  minds.  Knowledge 
involves  an  essential  relation  to  a  known  object.  Accidents  in- 
volve the  essential  relation  of  an  aptitude  to  inhere  in  substances. 
Actio  involves  an  essential  relation  to  an  agens,  and  passio  to  a 
patiens ;  matter  to  form  and  form  to  matter.  And  so  on.  In 
general,  wherever  any  subject  has  an  intrinsic  and  essential  exi- 
gence or  aptitude  or  inclination,  whereby  there  is  established  a 
connexion  of  this  subject  with,  or  a  reference  to,  something  else,  an 
ordination  or  ( '  ordo  "  to  something  else,  there  we  have  an  "  es- 
sential" relation.1  Such  a  relation  is  termed  "transcendental" 
because  it  can  be  verified  of  a  subject  in  any  category  ;  and,  since 
it  adds  nothing  real  to  its  subject  it  does  not  of  itself  constitute 
any  new  category  of  real  being.  Like  the  logical  relation  it  is 
referred  to  here  in  order  to  bring  out,  by  way  of  contrast,  the 
accidental  or  predicamental  relation  which  is  the  proper  sub- 
ject-matter of  the  present  chapter. 

92.   PREDICAMENTAL    RELATIONS  ;    THEIR   FOUNDATIONS 

1  Being  really  and  adequately  identical  with  its  foundation,  which  is  the  essence 
of  its  subject,  this  relation  does  not  necessarily  need  the  actual  existence  of  its  term. 
Thus  actual  knowledge  or  science,  which  is  a  habit  of  the  mind,  has  a  transcenden- 
tal relation  to  its  object  even  though  this  latter  be  not  actual  but  only  a  pure  pos- 
sibility. Similarly  the  accident  of  quantity  sustained  without  its  connatural  sub- 
stance in  the  Eucharist,  retains  its  transcendental  relation  to  the  latter. — Cf. 
BURU,  op.  cit.,  §  335  (p.  997). 


346  ONTOLOGY 

AND  DIVISIONS. — An  accidental  or  predicamental  relation  is  one 
which  is  not  essential  to  the  related  subject,  but  superadded  to,  and 
separable  from,  the  latter.  Such,  for  instance,  are  relations  of 
equality  or  inequality,  similarity  or  dissimilarity.  It  is  not  in- 
volved in  the  nature  of  the  subject  itself,  but  is  superinduced  on 
the  latter  by  reason  of  some  real  foundation  really  distinct  from 
the  nature  of  this  subject.  Its  sole  function  is  to  refer  the  subject 
to  the  term,  while  the  essential  or  transcendental  relation  is 
rather  an  intrinsic  attribute  or  aptitude  of  the  nature  itself  as  a 
principle  of  action,  or  an  effect  of  action.  The  real,  accidental 
relation  is  the  one  which  Aristotle  placed  in  a  category  apart  as 
one  of  the  ultimate  accidental  modes  of  real  being.  Hence  it  is 
called  a  "  predicamental "  relation.  What  are  its  principal 
sub-classes  ? 

Real  relations  are  divided  according  to  the  nature  of  their 
foundations.  But  some  relations  are  real  ex  utraque  parte — 
mutual  relations,  while  others  are  real  only  on  the  side — mixed 
relations.  Moreover,  some  real  relations  are  transcendental, 
others  predicamental.  Aristotle  in  assigning  three  distinct 
grounds  of  predicamental  relations  seems  to  have  included  some 
relations  that  are  transcendental.1  He  distinguishes2  (a)  rela- 
tions grounded  in  unity  and  multitude  ;  (ft)  relations  grounded 
in  efficient  causality ;  and  (c]  relations  grounded  in  "  commen- 
suration  ". 

(a)  By  "  unity  and  multitude  "  he  is  commonly  interpreted 
to  mean  identity  or  diversity  not  merely  in  quantity,  but  in  any 
"  formal "  factor,  and  therefore  also  in  quality \  and  in  nature  or 
substance.  Things  that  are  one  in  quantity  we  term  equal ;  one 
in  quality,  similar;  one  in  substance,  identical.  And  if  they 
are  not  one  in  these  respects  we  call  them  unequal,  dissimilar, 
distinct  or  diverse,  respectively.  About  quantity  as  a  foundation 
for  real,  predicamental  relations  there  can  be  no  difficulty.  In- 
deed it  is  in  a  certain  sense  implied  in  all  relations — at  least  as 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  336  (p.  990). 

2  Metaph.,  L.  v.,  ch.  xv.     Cf.  ST.  THOMAS,  in  loc. ,  lect.  17,  where,  approving  of  this 
triple  division,  he  writes  :  "  Cum  enim  relatio  quae  est  in  rebus,  consistat  in  ordine 
unius  rei  ad  aliam,  oportet  tot  modis  hujusmodi  relationes  esse,  quot  modis  contin- 
git  unam  rem  ad  aliam  ordinari.    Ordinatur  autem  una  res  ad  aliam,  vel  secundum 
esse,  prout  esse  unius  rei  dependet  ab  alia,  et  sic  est  tertius  modus.      Vel  secundum 
virtutem  activam  et  passivam,  secundum  quod  una  res  ab  alia  recipit,  vel  alteri  con- 
fert  aliquid ;  et  sic  est  secundus  modus.     Vel  secundum  quod  quantitas  unius  rei 
potest  mensurari  per  aliam ;  et  sic  est  primus  modus," 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     347 

apprehended  by  the  human  mind.  For  we  apprehend  relations, 
of  whatsoever  kind,  by  mental  comparison,  and  this  involves  the 
consciousness  of  number  or  plurality,  of  two  things  compared.1 
And  when  we  compare  things  on  the  basis  of  any  quality  we  do 
so  only  by  distinguishing  and  measuring  intensive  grades  in  this 
quality,  after  the  analogy  of  extensive  or  quantitative  measure- 
ment (80).  Nevertheless  just  as  quality  is  a  distinct  accident  irre- 
ducible to  quantity  (77),  so  are  relations  based  on  quality  differ- 
ent from  those  based  on  quantity.  But  what  about  substance  or 
nature  as  a  foundation  of  predicamental  relations  ?  For  these, 
as  distinct  from  transcendental  relations,  some  accident  really 
distinct  from  the  substance  seems  to  be  required.  The  sub- 
stantial, individual  identity  of  any  real  being  with  itself  is  only  a 
logical  relation,  for  there  are  not  two  really  distinct  extremes. 
The  specific  identity  of  John  with  James  in  virtue  of  their  com- 
mon human  nature  is  a  real  relation  but  it  would  appear  to  be 
transcendental.2  The  relation  of  the  real  John  and  the  real 
James  to  our  knowledge  of  them  is  the  transcendental  relation  of 
any  reality  to  knowledge,  the  relation  of  ontological  truth.  This 
relation  is  essentially  actual  in  regard  to  the  Divine  mind,  but 
only  potential,  and  accidentally  actual,  in  regard  to  any  created 
mind  (42).  The  relation  of  real  distinction  between  two  individ- 
ual substances  is  a  real  but  transcendental  relation,  grounded  in 
the  transcendental  attribute  of  oneness  which  characterizes  every 
real  being  (26,  27). 

(b)  Efficient  causality,  actio  et  passio,  can  undoubtedly  be  the 
ground  of  real  predicamental  relations.  If  the  action  is  transitive  3 
the  pattens  or  recipient  of  the  real  change  acquires  by  this  latter 
the  basis  of  a  relation  of  real  dependence  on  the  cause  or  agens. 
Again,  if  the  action  provokes  reaction,  so  that  there  is  real  inter- 
action, each  agens  being  also  apatiens,  there  arises  a  mutual  predica- 
mental relation  of  interdependence  between  the  two  agencies. 
Furthermore,  if  the  agent  itself  is  in  any  way  really  perfected  by 

1  Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  175.     For  transcendental  and  predicamental  unity,  cf. 
supra,  §§  26,  28. 

2  Cf.  infra,  p.  355.     Some  authors  hold  that  the  relation  in  question  is  predica- 
mental.    Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  p.  987.     The  nature  or  essence  of  any  individual 
would  seem  to  imply^n  its  very  concept  a  transcendental  relation  of  specific  identity 
with  all  other  actual  and  possible  individual  embodiments  of  this  essence.     The 
point  is  one  of  secondary  importance. 

3  Even  virtually,  though  not  formally.     The  creative  act  is  not  formally  transi- 
tive ;  it  is  virtually  so :  and  in  the  creature  it  grounds  the  latter's  relation  of  real 
dependence  on  the  Creator. 


348  ONTOLOGY 

the  action  there  arises  a  real  predicamental  relation  which  is 
mutual :  not  merely  a  real  relation  of  effect  to  agent  but  also 
of  agent  to  effect.  This  is  true  in  all  cases  of  what  scholastics 
call  "univocal"  as  distinct  from  "  equivocal"  causation.  Of  the 
former,  in  which  the  agent  produces  an  effect  like  in  nature  to  itself \ 
the  propagation  of  their  species  by  living  things  is  the  great  ex- 
ample. Here  not  only  is  the  relation  of  offspring  to  parents  a 
real  relation,  but  that  of  parents  to  offspring  is  also  a  real  relation. 
And  this  real  relation  is  permanent  because  it  is  grounded  not 
merely  in  the  transient  generative  processes  but  in  some  real  and 
abiding  result  of  these  processes — either  some  physical  disposition 
in  the  parents  themselves,1  or  some  specific  perfection  attributed 
by  extrinsic  denomination  to  the  individual  parents  :  the  parents 
are  in  a  sense  continued  in  their  offspring  :  "  generation  really  per- 
petuates the  species,  the  specific  nature,  and  in  this  sense  may  be 
said  to  perfect  the  individual  parents  ".2  In  cases  of  "  equivocal " 
causation — i.e.  where  the  effect  is  different  in  nature  from  the 
cause,  as  when  a  man  builds  a  house — the  agent  does  not  so 
clearly  benefit  by  the  action,  so  that  in  such  cases,  while  the  re- 
lation of  the  effect  to  the  cause  is  real,  some  authors  would  regard 
that  of  the  cause  to  the  effect  as  logical.3  When,  however,  we 
remember  that  the  efficient  activity  of  all  created  causes  is  neces- 
sarily dependent  on  the  Divine  Concursus,  and  necessarily  involves 
change  in  the  created  cause  itself,  we  can  regard  this  change  as  in 
all  cases  the  ground  of  a  real  relation  of  the  created  cause  to  its 
effect  But  the  creating  and  conserving  activity  of  the  Divine 
Being  cannot  ground  a  real  relation  of  the  latter  to  creatures  be- 
cause the  Divine  Being  is  Pure  and  Unchangeable  Actuality, 
acquiring  no  new  perfection,  and  undergoing  no  real  change,  by 
such  activity.4 

(c]  By  commensuration  as  a  basis  of  real  relations  Aristotle 
does  not  mean  quantitative  measurement,  but  the  determination 
of  the  perfection  of  one  reality  by  its  being  essentially  conformed 
to,  and  regulated  by,  another :  as  the  perfection  of  knowledge  or 

*Cf.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,§  336  (p.  989),  §  341  (p.  ion) ;  ST.  THOMAS,  iii. 
Sentent.,  Dist.,  viii.,  q.  i.,  art.  5. 

2  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  175. 

8  MERCIER,  ibid. 

4  "  Cum  igitur  Deus  sit  extra  totum  ordinem  creaturae,  et  omnes  creaturae 
ordinentur  ad  ipsum  et  non  e  converse  ;  manifestum  est  quod  creaturae  realiter, 
referuntur  ad  ipsum  Deum  ;  sed  in  Deo  non  est  aliqua  realis  relatio  ejus  ad  creaturas, 
sed  secundum  rationem  tantum,  inquantum  creaturae  referantur  ad  ipsum." — ST, 
THOMAS,  Summa  Theol,,  i.,  q.  xiii.,  art.  7, 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     349 

science,  for  instance,  is  determined  by  the  perfection  of  its  ob- 
ject. This  sort  of  commensuration,  or  essential  ordination  of  one 
reality  to  another,  is  obviously  the  basis  of  transcendental  relations. 
Some  authors  would  consider  that  besides  the  transcendental  rela- 
tion of  science  to  its  object,  a  relation  which  is  independent  of  the 
actual  existence  of  the  latter,  there  also  exists  an  accidental  rela- 
tion in  science  to  its  object  as  long  as  this  latter  is  in  actual  ex- 
istence. But  rather  it  should  be  said  that  just  as  the  transcen- 
dental truth- relation  of  any  real  object  to  intellect  is  fundamental 
(potential)  or  formal  (actual)  according  as  this  intellect  merely 
can  know  this  object  or  actually  does  know  it,  so  also  the  tran- 
scendental relation  of  knowledge  to  its  object  is  fundamental  or 
formal  according  as  this  object  is  merely  possible  or  actually 
existing. 

We  gather  from  the  foregoing  analysis  that  the  three  main 
classes  of  predicamental  relations  are  those  based  on  quantity, 
quality,  and  causality,  respectively. 

93.  IN  WHAT  DOES  THE  REALITY  OF  PREDICAMENTAL  RELA- 
TIONS CONSIST  ? — We  have  seen  that  not  all  relations  are  purely 
logical.  There  are  real  relations ;  and  of  these  some  are  not  merely 
aspects  of  the  other  categories  of  real  being,  not  merely  trans- 
cendental attributes  virtually  distinct  from,  but  really  identical 
with,  these  other  absolute  modes  of  real  being  which  we  designate 
as  "substance,"  "quantity,"  "quality,"  "cause,"  "effect,"  etc. 
There  are  real  relations  which  form  a  distinct  accidental  mode  of 
real  being  and  so  constitute  a  category  apart.  The  fact,  however, 
that  these  predicamental  relations  have  been  placed  by  Aristotle 
and  his  followers  in  a  category  apart  does  not  of  itself  prove  that 
the  predicamental  relation  is  a  special  reality  sui  generis,  really 
and  adequately  distinct  from  the  realities  which  constitute  the 
other  categories  (60).  If  the  predicamental  relation  be  not  a  purely 
logical  entity,  if  it  be  an  ens  rationis  cum  fundamento  in  re,  or,  in 
other  words,  if  the  object  of  our  concept  of  "  predicamental  rela- 
tion," has  a  foundation  in  reality  (e.g.  like  the  concepts  of  "  space  " 
and  "  time"),  then  it  may  reasonably  be  placed  in  a  category  apart, 
even  although  it  may  not  be  itself  formally  a  reality.  We  have 
therefore  to  see  whether  or  not  the  predicamental  relation  is,  or 
embodies,  any  mode  of  real  being  adequately  distinct  from  these 
modes  which  constitute  the  other  categories. 

The  predicamental  relation  is  real  in  the  sense  that  it  implies, 
in  addition  to  two  really  distinct  extremes,  a  real  foundation  in 


350  ONTOLOGY 

one  or  both  of  these  extremes,  a  real  accident  such  as  quantity, 
quality,  or  causality.  That  is  to  say,  considered  in  its  foundation 
or  cause,  considered  fundamentally  or  secundum  suum  esse  in  sub- 
jecto,  the  predicamental  relation  is  real,  inasmuch  as  its  foundation 
is  a  reality  independently  of  the  consideration  of  the  mind.  No 
doubt,  if  the  predicamental  relation,  adequately  considered,  im- 
plies no  other  reality  than  that  of  its  foundation  and  terms,  then 
the  predicamental  relation  does  not  contain  any  special  reality 
sui  generis,  distinct  from  substances,  quality,  quantity,  and  other 
such  absolute  modes  of  real  being.  This,  however,  does  not  pre- 
vent its  ranking  as  a  distinct  category  provided  it  adds  a  virtu- 
ally distinct  and  altogether  peculiar  aspect  to  those  absolute 
realities.  Now,  considered  adequately,  the  predicamental  relation 
adds  to  the  reality  it  has  in  its  foundation  the  actual  reference  of 
subject  to  term.  In  fact,  it  is  in  this  reference  of  subject  to  term, 
this  "esse  ad"  that  the  relation  formally  consists.  The  question 
therefore  may  be  stated  thus :  Is  this  formal  relation  of  subject  to 
term,  this  "  esse  ad"  a  real  entity  sui  generis,  really  distinct  from  the 
absolute  entities  of  subject,  term  and  foundation,  and  in  contra- 
distinction to  these  and  all  absolute  entities  a  "  relative  entity," 
actually  existing  in  the  real  universe  independently  of  our 
thought  ?  Or  is  it,  on  the  contrary,  itself  formally  a  mere  product 
of  our  thought,  a  product  of  the  mental  act  of  comparison,  an  ens 
rationis,  an  aspect  superadded  by  our  minds  to  the  extremes  com- 
pared, and  to  the  foundation  in  virtue  of  which  we  compare 
them? 

A  good  many  scholastics,  and  some  of  them  men  of  great  name,1 

1  Among  others  Cajetan,  Ferriariensis,  Capreolus,  Banez,  Joannes  a  St.  Thoma. 
C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  338  (p.  994) ;  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  174.  It  would  be  inter- 
esting to  know  how  precisely  those  authors  conceived  this  "  relative  "  entity,  this 
"  esse  ad,"  as  a  reality  independent  of  their  own  thought- activity.  C/.  art.  by  the  pre- 
sent writer  in  the  Irish  Theological  Quarterly  (vol.  vii.,  April,  1912  :  "  Reflections  on 
some  Forms  of  Monism,"  pp.  167-8) :  "  The  whole  universe  of  direct  experience 
displays  a  unity  of  order  or  design  which  pervades  it  through  and  through ;  it  is  a 
revelation  of  intelligent  purpose.  Now  a  Cosmos,  an  orderly  universe — which  is  in- 
telligible only  as  the  expression  of  intelligent  purpose,  and  not  otherwise — is  a  system 
of  interrelated  factors.  But  relating  is  unintelligible  except  as  an  expression  of  the 
activity  of  mind  or  spirit,  that  is,  of  something  at  least  analogous  to  our  mental 
activity  of  comparing  and  judging.  Scholastic  philosophers,  as  we  know,  discuss 
the  question  whether  or  how  far  the  exact  object  of  our  '  relation  '  concept  is  real ; 
that  is,  whether  this  object  is,  in  itself  and  apart  from  the  terms  related  [and  the 
foundation],  a  mere  ens  rationis,  a  product  of  our  thought,  or  whether  it  is  in  itself 
something  more  than  this ;  and  some  of  them  hold  that  there  are  relations  which, 
in  themselves  and  formally  as  relations,  are  something  more  than  mere  products  of 
our  thought.  Now  if  there  be  such  relations,  since  they  are  not  products  of  our 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE    351 


have  espoused  the  former  alternative,  considering  that  the  reality 
of  the  predicamental  relation  cannot  be  vindicated — against  ideal- 
ists, who  would  reduce  all  relations  to  mere  logical  entities — 
otherwise  than  by  according  to  the  relation  considered  formally, 
i.e.  secundum  suum  "  esse  ad"  an  entity  in  the  actual  order  of  things 
independent  of  our  thought :  adding  as  an  argument  that  if  rela- 
tion formally  as  such  is  anything  at  all,  if  all  relation  be  not  a 
mere  mental  fabrication,  it  is  essentially  a  "  relative  "  entity,  and 
that  manifestly  a  "  relative  "  entity  cannot  be  really  identical  with 
any  "  absolute  "  entity.  And  they  claim  for  this  view  the  authority 
of  St.  Thomas.1 

thought,  we  may  fairly  ask  :  Must  they  be  the  product  of  some  thought  ?  And  from 
our  analysis  of  our  very  notion  of  what  a  relation  is,  it  would  seem  that  they  must  be 
in  some  sort  or  other  a  product  or  expression  of  some  thought-activity  :  even  relations 
between  material  things.  It  is  in  determining  how  precisely  this  is,  or  can  be,  that 
the  theist  and  the  monist  differ.  The  theist  regards  all  material  things,  with  their  real 
relations — and  all  our  finite  human  minds,  which  apprehend  the  material  world  and  its 
relations  and  themselves  and  one  another — as  being  indeed  in  a  true  sense  terms  or 
objects  of  the  Thought  of  God  ;  not,  however,  as  therefore  identical  or  consubstantial 
with  the  Divine  Spirit,  but  as  distinct  from  It  though  dependent  on  It :  inasmuch  as 
he  holds  the  Divine  Thought  to  be  creative,  and  regards  all  these  things  as  its  created 
terms.  The  kinship  he  detects  between  matter  and  spirit  lies  precisely  in  this,  that 
matter  is  for  him  a  created  term  of  the  Divine  Thought.  For  him  too,  therefore, 
matter  can  have  no  existence  except  as  a  term  of  thought — the  creative  Thought  of 
God."  Not  that  "  the  intelligible  relations  apprehended  by  us  in  matter  are  .  .  . 
identical  in  reality  with  the  thought-activity  of  the  Divine  Mind,"  as  Ontologists 
have  taught  \cf.  supra,  14,  18,  19]  ;  nor  that  we  can  directly  infer  the  existence  of  a 
Supreme  Spirit  from  the  existence  of  matter,  as  Berkeley  tried  to  do  by  erroneously 
regarding  the  latter  merely  as  an  essentially  mind-dependent  phenomenon  ;  because 
"  for  the  orthodox  theist  matter  is  in  its  own  proper  nature  not  spiritual,  mental, 
psychical ;  not  anything  after  the  manner  of  a  thought-process,  or  endowed  with  the 
spirit-mode  of  being  ".  If  predicamental  relations,  such  as  quality  or  similarity  of 
material  things,  are,  as  those  medieval  scholastics  contended,  real  entities,  "  relative" 
in  their  nature,  and  really  distinct  from  their  extremes  and  foundations,  did  those 
scholastics  conceive  such  '  relative  entities '  as  essentially  mind-dependent  entities  ? 
If  they  did  they  would  probably  have  conceived  them  in  the  sense  of  Berkeley,  as 
created  terms  of  the  Divine  Thought,  rather  than  in  the  Ontologist  sense  which 
would  identify  them  with  the  Divine  Thought  itself.  But  it  is  not  likely  that  they 
conceived  such  relative  entities  as  essentially  thought-dependent,  any  more  than 
the  absolute  material  realities  related  to  one  another  by  means  of  these  relative 
entities.  On  the  other  hand  it  is  not  easy  to  see  how  such  relative  entities  can  be 
anything  more  than  mere  products  of  some  thought-activity  or  other. 

1  They  rely  especially  on  this  text  from  the  De  Potentia  (q.  vii.,  art.  9) :  "  Relatio 
est  debilioris  esse  inter  omnia  praedicamenta ;  ideo  putaverunt  quidam  earn  esse  ex 
secundis  intellectibus.  Secundum  ergo  hanc  positionem  sequeretur  quod  relatio  non 
sit  in  rebus  extra  animam  sed  in  solo  intellectu,  sicut  intentio  generis  et  speciei,  et 
secundarum  substantiarum.  Hoc  autem  esse  non  potest.  In  nullo  enim  praedi- 
camento  ponitur  aliquid  nisi  res  praeter  animam  existens.  Nam  ens  rationis 
dividitur  contra  ens  divisum  per  decem  praedicamenta.  ...  Si  autem  relatio  non 
est  in  rebus  extra  animam  non  poneretur  ad  aliquid  unum  genus  praedicamenti." 


35*  ONTOLOGY 

The  great  majority  of  scholastics,  however,  espouse  the  second 
alternative :  that  the  relation,  considered  formally,  "  secundum 
esse  ad?  is  a  product  of  our  mental  comparison  of  subject  with 
term.  It  is  not  itself  a  real  entity  or  a  real  mode,  superadded 
to  the  reality  of  extremes  and  foundation. 

In  the  first  place  there  is  no  need  to  suppose  the  reality  of  such  a 
relative  entity.  Entia  non  sunt  multiplicand*  prater  necessitatem. 
It  is  an  abuse  of  realism  to  suppose  that  \h& formal  element  of  a  rela- 
tion, its  "  esse  ad"  is  a  distinct  and  separate  reality.  The  reality  of 
the  praedicamental  relation  is  safeguarded  without  any  such  postul- 
ate. Since  the  predicamental  relation,  considered  adequately,  i.e. 
not  merely  formally  but  fundamentally,  not  merely  secundum  esse 
ad  but  secundum  esse  in,  involves  as  its  foundation  an  absolute 
accident  which  is  real  independently  of  our  thought,  the  predi- 
camental relation  is  not  a  mere  ens  rationis.  It  has  a  foundation 
in  reality.  It  is  an  ens  rationis  cum  fundamento  in  re.  This  is 
a  sufficient  counter-assertion  to  Idealism,  and  a  sufficient  reason 
for  treating  relation  as  a  distinct  category  of  real  being. 

That  there  is  no  need  for  such  a  relative  entity  will  be  mani- 
fest if  we  consider  the  simple  case  of  two  bars  of  iron  each  a 
yard  long.  The  length  of  each  is  an  absolute  accident  of  each. 
The  length  of  either,  considered  absolutely  and  in  itself,  is  not 
formally  the  equality  of  this  with  the  other.  Nor  are  both  lengths 
considered  separately  the  formal  relation  of  equality.  But  both 
considered  together  are  the  adequate  foundation  of  this  formal 
relation ;  both  considered  together  are  this  relation  potentially, 
fundamentally,  so  that  all  that  is  needed  for  the  actual,  formal 
relation  of  equality  is  the  mental  apprehension  of  the  two  lengths 
together.  The  mental  process  of  comparison  is  the  only  thing 
required  to  make  the  potential  relation  actual ;  and  the  product 
of  this  mental  process  is  the  formality  or  "esse  ad"  of  the  relation, 
the  actual  reference  of  the  extremes  to  each  other.  Besides  the 
absolute  accidents  which  constitute  the  foundation  of  the  rela- 
tion something  more  is  required  for  the  constitution  of  the 
adequate  predicamental  relation.  This  "something  more,"  how- 
ever, is  a  mind  capable  of  comparing  the  extremes,  and  not  any 
real  entity  distinct  from  extremes  and  foundation.  Antecedently 
to  the  act  of  comparison  the  formally  relative  element  of  the 
relation,  its  "  esse  ad?  was  not  anything  actual ;  it  was  the  mere 
comparability  of  the  extremes  in  virtue  of  the  foundation.  If  the 
"esse  ad"  were  a  separate  real  entity,  a  relative  entity,  really 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE    353 

distinct  from  extremes  and  foundation,  what  sort  of  entity  could 
it  be  ?  Being  an  accident,  it  should  inhere  in,  or  be  a  mode  of 
its  subject.  But  if  it  did  it  would  lose  its  formally  relative 
character  by  becoming  an  inherent  mode  of  an  absolute 
reality.  While  to  conceive  it  as  an  entity  astride  on  both  ex- 
tremes, and  bridging  or  connecting  these  together,  would  be  to 
substitute  the  crude  imagery  of  the  imagination  for  intellectual 
thought. 

In  the  second  place,  if  a  subject  can  acquire  a  relation,  or 
lose  a  relation,  without  undergoing  any  real  change,  then  the  rela- 
tion considered  formally  as  such,  or  secundum  "  esse  ad"  cannot 
be  a  reality.  But  a  subject  can  acquire  or  lose  a  relation  without 
undergoing  any  real  change.  Therefore  the  relation  considered 
formally,  as  distinct  from  its  foundation  and  extremes,  is  not 
a  reality. 

The  minor  of  this  argument  may  be  proved  by  the  considera- 
tion of  a  few  simple  examples.  A  child  already  born  is  neither 
larger  nor  smaller  than  its  brother  that  will  be  born  two  years 
hence.1  But  after  the  birth  of  the  latter  child  the  former  can 
acquire  those  relations  successively  without  any  real  change  in 
itself,  and  merely  by  the  growth  of  the  younger  child.  Again, 
one  white  ball  A  is  similar  in  colour  to  another  white  ball  B. 
Paint  the  latter  black,  and  eo  ipso  the  former  loses  its  relation  of 
resemblance  without  any  real  change  in  itself. 

And  this  appears  to  be  the  view  of  St.  Thomas.  If,  he  writes,  another 
man  becomes  equal  in  size  to  me  by  growing  while  I  remain  unchanged  in 
size,  then  although  eo  ipso  I  become  equal  in  size  to  him,  thus  acquiring  a  new 
relation,  nevertheless  I  gain  or  acquire  nothing  new  :  "  nihil  advenit  mihi 
de  novo,  per  hoc  quod  incipio  esse  alteri  aequalis  per  ejus  mutationem  ".3 
Relation,  he  says,  is  an  extramental  reality  by  reason  of  its  foundation  or 
cause,  whereby  one  reality  is  referred  to  another.3  Relation  itself,  considered 
formally  as  distinct  from  its  foundation,  is  not  a  reality ;  it  is  real  only  inas- 
much as  its  foundation  is  real.4  Again,  relation  is  something  inherent,  but 
not  formally  as  a  relation,  and  hence  it  can  disappear  without  any  real  change 

1  C/.  ST.  ANSELM,  Monolog.,  ch.  xxvi. 

2  In  v.  Physic.,  lect.  3,  par.  b. 

3  "  Relatio  habet  quod  sit  res  naturae  ex  sua  causa  per  quam  una  res  naturalem 
ordinem  habet  ad  alteram." — Quodl.  i,  art.  2. 

4  "In   hoc   differt   Ad   Aliquid   [i.e.  Relation]   ab   aliis  generibus;    quod  alia 
genera  ex  propria  sui  ratione  habent,  quod  aliquid  sint,  sicut  quantitas  ex  hoc  ipso 
quod  est  quantitas,  aliquid  ponit :    et  similiter  est  de  aliis.     Sed  Ad  Aliquid   ex 
propria  sui   generis  ratione  non  habet,  quod   ponat  aliquid,  sed  ad   aliquid.  .  .  . 
Habet  autem  relatio  quod  sit  aliquid  reale  ex  eo,  quod  relationem  causat." — Quodl. 
9,  art.  4.     C/.  De  Potentia,  q.  ii.,  art.  5. 

23 


354  ONTOLOGY 

in  its  subject.1  A  real  relation  may  be  destroyed  in  one  or  other  of  two  ways  : 
either  by  the  destruction  or  change  of  the  foundation  in  the  subject,  or  by  the 
destruction  of  the  term,  entailing  the  cessation  of  the  reference,  without  any 
change  in  the  subject?  Hence,  too,  the  reason  alleged  by  St.  Thomas  why 
relation,  unlike  the  other  categories  of  real  being,  can  be  itself  divided  into 
logical  entity  and  real  entity,  ens  rationis  and  ens  reale  :  because  formally  it  is 
an  ens  rationis,  and  only  fundamentally,  or  in  virtue  of  its  foundation,  is  it  an 
ens  reale?  And  hence,  finally,  the  reason  why  St.  Thomas,  following 
Aristotle,  describes  relation  as  having  a  "lesser  reality,"  an  "esse  debilius,"4 
than  the  other  or  absolute  categories  of  real  being :  not  as  if  it  were  a  sort  of 
diminutive  entity,  intermediate  between  nothingness  and  the  absolute  modes 
of  reality,  but  because  being  dependent  for  its  formal  actuality  not  merely  on 
a  foundation  in  its  subject,  but  also  on  a  term  to  which  the  latter  is  referred, 
it  can  perish  not  merely  by  the  destruction  of  its  subject  like  other  accidents, 
but  also  by  the  destruction  of  its  term  while  subject  and  foundation  remain 
unchanged. 

If,  then,  the  real  relation,  considered  formally  or  "  secundum 
esse  ad"  is  not  a  reality,  the  relation  under  this  aspect  is  a 
logical,  not  a  real,  accident. 

To  constitute  a  mutual  real  relation  there  is  needed  a 
foundation  in  both  of  the  extremes.  As  long  as  the  term  of  the 
relation  does  not  actually  exist,  not  only  does  the  relation  not 
exist  formally  and  actually,  but  it  is  not  even  adequately 
potential :  the  foundation  in  the  subject  alone  is  not  an  adequate 
foundation. 

To  this  view,  which  denies  any  distinct  reality  to  the  pre- 
dicamental  relation  considered  formally,  it  has  been  objected 

1 "  Relatio  est  aliquid  inhaerens  licet  non  ex  hoc  ipso  quod  est  relatio.  .  .  .  Et 
ideo  nihil  prohibet,  quod  esse  desinat  hujusmodi  accidens  sine  mutatione  ejus  in  quo 
est." — De  Potentia,  q.  vii.,  art.  9,  ad.  7. 

2 "  Et  utroque  modo  contingit  in  realibus  relationibus  destrui  relationem  :  vel 
per  destructionem  quantitatis  [or  other  foundation],  unde  ad  hanc  mutationem 
quantitatis  sequitur  per  accidens  mutatio  relationis :  vel  etiam  secundum  quod 
cessat  respectus  ad  alterum,  remoto  illo  ad  quod  refer ebatur ;  et  tune  relatio  cessat, 
nulla  mutatione  facta  in  ipsa.  Unde  in  illis  in  quibus  non  est  relatio  nisi  secundum 
hunc  respectum,  veniunt  et  recedunt  relationes  sine  aliqua  mutatione  ejus,  quod 
refertur." — In  i.  Sent.,  Dist.  xxvi.,  q.  ii.,  art.  i,  ad.  3. 

*  "  Relationes  differunt  in  hoc  ab  omnibus  aliis  rerum  generibus,  quia  ea  quae 
sunt  aliorum  generum,  ex  ipsa  ratione  sui  generis  habent,  quod  sint  res  naturae, 
sicut  quantitates  ex  ratione  quantitatis,  et  qualitates  ex  ratione  qualitatis.  Sed 
relationes  non  habent  quod  sint  res  naturae  ex  ratione  respectus  ad  alterum.  .  .  . 
Sed  relatio  habet  quod  sit  res  naturae  ex  sua  causa,  per  quam  una  res  naturalem 
ordinem  habet  ad  alteram,  qui  quidem  ordo  naturalis  et  realis  est  ipsis  ipsa 
relatio." — QuodL,  i,  art.  2. 

4  Cf.  supra,  p.  351,  n.  i ;  in  which  context  we  may  reasonably  suppose  him  to  be 
arguing  that  relation  considered  adequately  is  not  a  mere  logical  entity,  "  ex 
secundis  intellectibus,"  inasmuch  as,  having  a  real  foundation  in  things  outside  the 
mind,  it  is  in  this  respect  real,  independently  of  our  {thought. 


RELATION;  THE  RELATIVE  AND  THE  ABSOLUTE     355 

that  the  predicamental  relation  is  thus  confounded  with  the 
transcendental  relation.  But  this  is  not  so ;  for  the  trans- 
cendental relation  is  always  essential  to  its  subject,  whatever 
this  subject  may  be,  while  the  predicamental  relation,  considered 
formally,  is  a  logical  accident  separable  from  its  subject,  and 
considered  fundamentally  it  is  some  absolute  accident  really  dis- 
tinct from  the  substance  of  the  related  extremes.  For  instance, 
the  action  which  mediates  between  cause  and  effect  is  itself 
transcendentally  related  to  both ;  while  it  is  at  the  same  time 
the  adequate  foundation  whereby  cause  and  effect  are  predica- 
mentally  related  to  each  other.1 

If  what  we  have  called  the  formal  element  of  a  relation  be 
nothing  really  distinct  from  the  extremes  and  foundation,  it 
follows  that  some  real  relations  between  creatures  are  really 
identical  with  their  substances ; 2  and  to  this  it  has  been  objected 
that  no  relation  in  creatures  can  be,  quoad  rem>  substantial : 
"Nulla  relatio,"  says  St.  Thomas,3  "est  substantia  secundum 
rem  in  creaturis  ".  To  this  it  may  be  replied  that  even  in  these 
cases  the  relation  itself,  considered  adequately,  is  not  wholly 
identical  with  the  substance  of  either  extreme.  It  superadds  a 
separable  logical  accident  to  these.4 

Finally  it  is  objected  that  the  view  which  denies  a  distinct 
reality  to  the  formal  element  of  a  real  relation,  to  its  "  esse  ad" 
equivalently  denies  all  reality  to  relations,  and  is  therefore  in 
substance  identical  with  the  idealist  doctrine  already  rejected 
(90).  But  this  is  a  misconception.  According  to  idealists, 
relations  grounded  on  quality,  quantity,  causality,  etc. ,  are  exclus- 
ively in  the  intellect,  in  our  mental  activity  and  its  mental  products, 
in  our  concepts  alone,  and  are  in  no  true  sense  characteristic  of 
reality.  This  is  very  different  from  saying  that  our  concepts  of 
such  relations  are  grounded  in  the  realities  compared,  and  that  these 
realities  are  really  endowed  with  everything  that  constitutes  such 
relations,  the  comparative  act  of  the  intellect  being  required  merely 

1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  341  (p.  1008).  *ibid.t  p.  1007  ;  cf.  supra,  p.  347. 

3  In  i.  Sentent.,  Dist.  iv.,  q.  i,  art.  i,  ad.  3. 

4C/.  URRABURU,  ibid.,  pp.  1006-7  :  "  Deinde  nullam  relationem  esse  substant- 
iam  scripsit  [S.  Thomas]  vel  quia  plerumque  ratio  fundandi  non  est  substantia.  .  . 
vel  potius  quia  semper  relatio,  etiam  cum  in  substantia  fundatur,  aliquid  addit  supra 
substantiam  cujuslibet  extremi  relati  singillatim  simpti,  quia  non  identificatur  cum 
fundamento  prout  se  tenet  ex  parte  solius  subject!,  vel  solius  termini,  sed  prout  se 
tenet  ea  parte  utriusque.  Quare  relatio  .  .  .  semper  exprimit  denominationem 
contingentem  et  accidentaliter  supervenientem  subjecto,  utpote  quae  adesse  vel  abesse 
potest,  prout  adsit  vel  deficiat  terminus." 


356  ONTOLOGY 

to  apprehend  these  characteristics  and  so  to  give  the  relation  its 
formal  completeness.1  There  is  all  the  difference  that  exists  be- 
tween a  theory  which  so  exaggerates  the  constitutive  function  of 
thought  as  to  reduce  all  intellectual  knowledge  to  a  knowledge  of 
mere  subjective  mental  appearances,  and  a  theory  which,  while  re- 
cognizing this  function  and  its  products,  will  not  allow  that  these 
cast  any  cloud  or  veil  between  the  intellect  and  a  genuine  insight 
into  objective  reality.  These  mental  processes  are  guided  by 
reality ;  the  entia  rationis  which  are  their  products  are  grounded 
in  reality ;  moreover  we  can  quite  well  distinguish  between  these 
mental  modes  and  products  of  our  intellectual  activity  and  the 
real  contents  revealed  to  the  mind  in  these  modes  and  processes. 
So  long,  therefore,  as  we  avoid  the  mistake  of  ascribing  to  the 
objective  reality  itself  any  of  these  mental  modes  (as,  for  instance, 
extreme  realists  do  when  they  assert  the  extramental  reality  of 
the  formal  universal),  our  recognition  of  them  can  in  no  way  jeop- 
ardize the  objective  validity  of  intellectual  knowledge.  Perhaps 
an  excessive  timidity  in  this  direction  is  in  some  degree  account- 
able for  the  "abuse  of  realism"  which  ascribes  to  the  formal 
element  of  a  relation  a  distinct  extramental,2  objective  reality. 

1  "  Illi  enim  [the  reference  is  to  certain  medieval  idealists]  quamvis  agnoscerent 
duo  alba  existentia  negabant  dari  actu  in  rebus  formalem  similaritatem  [i.e.  even 
after  the  comparative  activity  of  thought],  sed  formalem  similitudinem,  et  a  Ham 
quamvis  relationem,  reponebant  in  actu  intellectus  unum  cum  alio  comparantis  ;  nos 
vero  ante  actum  intellectus  agnoscimus  in  rebus,  quidquid  sufficit  ad  constituendam 
relationem  similitudinis,  diversitatis,  paternitatis,  etc.,  ita  ut  hujusmodi  denomina- 
tiones  non  verificentur  de  actu  intellectus  unum  cum  alio  comparantis,  sed  plenam 
habeant  in  rebus  ipsis  verificationem." — URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  p.  1010. 

2 In  what  sense  "  extramental"  ?-— Cf.  supra,  p.  350,  n.  i  (end). 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES. 

94.  TRADITIONAL  CONCEPT  OF  CAUSE. — The  modes  of  real 
being  which  we  have  been  so  far  examining — substance,  quality, 
quantity,  relation — are  modes  of  reality  considered  as  static. 
But  it  was  pointed  out  in  an  early  chapter  (ch.  ii.)  that  the 
universe  of  our  experience  is  subject  to  change,  that  it  is  ever 
becoming,  that  it  is  the  scene  of  a  continuous  world-process 
which  is  apparently  regulated  by  more  or  less  stable  principles 
or  laws,  these  laws  and  processes  constituting  the  universal  order 
which  it  is  the  duty  of  the  philosopher  to  study  and  explain. 
We  must  now  return  to  this  kinetic  and  dynamic  aspect  of 
reality,  and  investigate  the  principles  of  change  in  things  by  a 
study  of  Causes. 

As  with  the  names  of  the  other  ultimate  categories,  so  too 
here,  the  general  sense  of  the  term  "cause"  (causa,  cu-nov)  is 
familiar  to  all,  while  analysis  reveals  a  great  variety  of  modalities 
of  this  common  signification.  We  understand  by  a  cause  any- 
thing which  has  a  positive  influence  of  any  sort  on  the  being  or 
happening  of  something  else.  In  philosophy  this  is  the  meaning 
which  has  been  attached  traditionally  to  the  term  since  the  days 
of  Aristotle  ;  though  in  its  present-day  scientific  use  the  term  has 
almost  lost  this  meaning,  mainly  through  the  influence  of  modern 
phenomenism.1  The  traditional  notion  of  cause  is  usually 
expounded  by  comparing  it  with  certain  kindred  notions : 
principle,  condition,  occasion,  reason. 

A  principle  is  that  from  which  anything  proceeds  in  any  way 
whatsoever.'2'  Any  sort  of  intrinsic  connexion  between  two 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  218.  For  the  concepts  of  "  cause  "  and  "  causality  " 
in  the  inductive  sciences,  as  well  as  for  much  that  cannot  be  repeated  here,  the 
student  may  consult  with  advantage  vol.  ii.,  p.  iv.,  ch.  in.,  iv.  and  vi.  of  the  work 
referred  to. 

2"  Id  a  quo  aliquid  procedit  quocunque  modo." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol., 
i.,  q.  xxxiii.,  art.  i. 

357 


358  ONTOLOGY 

objects  of  thought  is  sufficient  to  constitute  the  one  a  "  prin- 
ciple" of  the  other;  but  a  mere  extrinsic  or  time  sequence  is  not 
sufficient  A  logical  principle  is  some  truth  from  which  further 
truths  are  or  may  be  derived.  A  real  principle  is  some  reality 
from  which  the  being  or  happening  of  something  originates  and 
proceeds.1  If  this  procession  involves  a  real  and  positive 
influence  of  the  principle  on  that  which  proceeds  from  it,  such  a 
real  principle  is  a  cause.  But  there  may  be  a  real  and  intrinsic 
connexion  without  any  such  influence.  For  instance,  in  the 
substantial  changes  which  occur  in  physical  nature  the  generation 
of  the  new  substantial  formative  principle  necessarily  presupposes 
the  privation  of  the  one  which  antecedently  "  informed  "  the 
material  principle;  but  this  "privatio  formae"  has  no  positive 
influence  on  the  generation  of  the  new  "  form  "  ;  it  is,  however,  the 
necessary  and  natural  antecedent  to  the  generation  of  the  latter ; 
hence  although  this  " privatio  formae"  is  a  real  principle  of 
substantial  change  (the  process  or  fieri)  it  is  not  a  cause  of  the 
latter.  The  notion  of  principle,  even  of  real  principle,  is  there- 
fore wider  than  the  notion  of  cause.2 

A  condition,  in  the  proper  sense  of  a  necessary  condition  or 
conditio  sine  qua  non,  is  something  which  must  -be  realized  or 
fulfilled  before  the  event  or  effect  in  question  can  happen  or  be 
produced.  On  the  side  of  the  latter  there  is  real  dependence, 
but  from  the  side  of  the  former  there  is  no  real  and  positive  in- 
fluence on  the  happening  of  the  event.  The  influence  of  the 
condition  is  negative ;  or,  if  positive,  it  is  only  indirect,  consisting 
in  the  removal  of  some  obstacle — "  removen s  probibens  " — to  the 
positive  influence  of  the  cause.  In  this  precisely  a  condition 
differs  from  a  cause :  windows,  for  instance,  are  a  condition  for 
the  lighting  of  a  room  in  the  daylight,  but  the  sun  is  the  cause. 
The  distinction  is  clear  and  intelligible,  nor  may  it  be  ignored  in 

1  Hence   Aristotle's   definition  of  principle,   including  both   logical   and   real 
principles  :     natrcoc  fj.ev  ofiv  Koivbv  r&v  a.px®v  T^  KP&TOV  clvai  30ev  TJ  tffriv  f)  yiyvfrai  f) 
yiyt>caffK€Tai. — Metaph.  IV.,  ch.  i. 

2  A  cause  must  be  prior  in  nature  to  its  effect,  but  not  necessarily  prior  in  time. 
In  fact  the  action  of  the  cause  and  the  production  of  the  effect  must  be  simultaneous. 
Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  220.     Considered  formally  as  correlatives  they  are  sitnul 
natura.     A  principle  must  likewise  be  in  some  sense  prior  to  what  proceeds  from  it, 
not  necessarily,  however,  by  priority  of  time,  nor  by  priority  of  nature  involving  real 
dependence.     The  Christian  Revelation  regarding  the  Blessed  Trinity  involves  that 
the  First  Divine  Person  is  the  "  principle  "  from  which  the  Second  proceeds,  and  the 
First  and  the  Second  the  "  principle  "  from  which  the  Third  proceeds ;  yet  here 
there  is  no   dependence  or  inequality,   or   any  priority   except   the  "  relation   of 
origin  "  be  called  priority. 


CA  USALIT  Y;  CL  AS  SI  PICA  TION  OF  CA  USES  3  59 

a  philosophical  analysis  of  causality.  At  the  same  time  it  is  easy 
to  understand  that  where,  as  in  the  inductive  sciences,  there  is 
question  of  discovering  all  the  antecedents,  positive  and  negative, 
of  any  given  kind  of  phenomenon,  in  order  to  bring  to  light  and 
formulate  the  law  or  laws  according  to  which  such  phenomenon 
occurs,  the  distinction  between  cause  and  condition  is  of  minor 
importance.1 

An  occasion  is  any  circumstance  or  combination  of  circumstances 
favourable  to  the  action  of  a  free  cause.  For  instance,  a  forced 
sale  is  an  occasion  for  buying  cheaply ;  night  is  an  occasion  of 
theft ;  bad  companionship  is  an  occasion  of  sin.  An  occasion 
has  no  intrinsic  connexion  with  the  effect  as  in  the  case  of  a 
principle,  nor  is  it  necessary  for  the  production  of  the  effect  as 
in  the  case  of  a  condition.  It  is  spoken  of  only  in  connexion 
with  the  action  of  a  free  cause  ;  and  it  differs  from  a  cause  in 
having  no  positive  and  direct  influence  on  the  production  of  the 
effect.  It  has,  however,  a  real  though  indirect  influence  on  the 
production  of  the  effect  by  soliciting  and  aiding  the  determina- 
tion of  the  free  efficient  cause  to  act.  In  so  far  as  it  does  exert 
such  an  influence  it  may  be  regarded  as  a  partial  efficient  cause, 
not  a  physical  but  a  moral  cause,  of  the  effect. 

To  ask  for  the  reason  of  any  event  or  phenomenon,  or  of 
the  nature  or  existence  of  any  reality,  is  to  demand  an  explana- 
tion of  the  latter ;  it  is  to  seek  what  accounts  for  the  latter,  what 
makes  this  intelligible  to  our  minds.  Whatever  is  a  cause  is 
therefore  also  a  reason,  but  the  latter  notion  is  wider  than  the 
former.  Whatever  explains  a  truth  is  a  logical  reason  of  the 
latter.  But  since  all  truths  are  concerned  with  realities  they 
must  have  ultimately  real  reasons,  i.e.  explanatory  principles 
inherent  in  the  realities  themselves.  The  knowledge  of  these 
real  or  ontological  principles  of  things  is  the  logical  reason  of 
our  understanding  of  the  things  themselves.  But  the  ontological 
principles,  which  are  the  real  reasons  of  the  things,  are  wider  in 
extent  than  the  causes  of  these  things,  for  they  include  principles 
that  are  not  causes. 

Furthermore,  the  grades  of  reality  which  we  discover  in 
things  by  the  activity  of  abstract  thought,  and  whereby  we 
compare,  classify  and  define  those  things,  we  apprehend  as  ex- 
planatory principles  of  the  latter ;  and  these  principles,  though 
really  in  the  things,  and  therefore  real  "  reasons,"  are  not  "  causes  ". 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  216. 


360  ONTOLOGY 

Thus,  life  is  a  real  reason,  though  not  a  cause,  of  sensibility  in 
the  animal  organism  ;  the  soul's  independence  of  matter  in  its 
mode  of  existence  is  a  real  reason,  though  not  a  cause,  of  its 
spiritual  activities.  Hence,  between  a  reason  and  that  which  it 
accounts  for  there  may  be  only  a  logical  distinction,  while  between 
a  cause  and  that  which  it  causes  there  must  be  a  real  distinc- 
tion (38). 

To  understand  all  the  intrinsic  principles  which  constitute 
the  essence  of  anything  is  to  know  the  sufficient  reason  of  its  reality. 
To  understand  all  the  extrinsic  principles  which  account  for  its 
actual  existence  is  to  know  the  sufficient  reason  of  its  existence  ; 
and  to  understand  this  latter  adequately  is  to  realize  that  the 
thing  depends  ultimately  for  its  actual  existence  on  a  Reality  or 
Being  which  necessarily  exists  by  virtue  of  its  own  essence. 

What  has  been  called  the  Principle  of  Sufficient  Reason  asserts,  when 
applied  to  reality,  that  every  existing  reality  must  have  a  sufficient  reason  for 
existing  and  for  being  what  it  is.1  Unlike  the  Principle  of  Causality  which  is 
an  axiomatic  or  self-evident  truth,  this  principle  is  rather  a  necessary  postu- 
late of  all  knowledge,  an  assumption  that  reality  is  intelligible.  It  does  not 
mean  that  all  reality,  or  even  any  single  finite  reality,  is  adequately  intelligible 
to  our  finite  minds.  In  the  words  of  Bossuet,  we  do  not  know  everything 
about  anything  :  "  nous  ne  savons  le  tout  de  rien  ". 

In  regard  to  contingent  essences,  if  these  be  composite  we  can  find  a 
sufficient  reason  why  they  are  such  in  their  constitutive  principles  ;  but  in 
regard  to  simple  essences,  or  to  the  simple  constitutive  principles  of  composite 
essences,  we  can  find  no  sufficient  reason  why  they  are  such  in  anything  even 
logically  distinct  from  themselves  :  they  are  what  they  are  because  they  are 
what  they  are,  and  to  demand  why  they  are  what  they  are,  is,  as  Aristotle  re- 
marked, to  ask  an  idle  question.  At  the  same  time,  when  we  have  convinced 
ourselves  that  their  actual  existence  involves  the  existence  of  a  Supreme,  Self- 
Existent,  Intelligent  Being,  we  can  see  that  the  essence  of  this  Being  is  the 
ultimate  ground  of  the  intrinsic  possibility  of  all  finite  essences  (20). 

In  regard  to  contingent  existences  the  Principle  of  Sufficient  Reason  is 
coincident  with  the  Principle  of  Causality,  inasmuch  as  the  sufficient  reason 
of  the  actual  existence  of  any  contingent  thing  consists  in  the  extrinsic  real  prin- 
ciples which  are  its  causes.  The  existence  of  contingent  things  involves  the 
existence  of  a  Necessary  Being.  We  may  say  that  the  sufficient  reason  for 
the  existence  of  the  Necessary  Being  is  the  Divine  Essence  Itself ;  but  this 
is  merely  denying  that  there  is  outside  this  Being  any  sufficient  reason,  i.e.  any 
cause  of  the  latter's  existence  ;  it  is  the  recognition  that  the  Principle  of  Caus- 
ality is  inapplicable  to  the  Necessary  Being.  The  Principle  of  Sufficient 
Reason,  in  this  application  of  it,  is  logically  posterior  to  the  Principle  of 
Causality.2 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §  16  ;  ii.,  §§  214,  224  (p.  113). 

2  Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  252. 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  361 

95.  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES:  ARISTOTLE'S  FOURFOLD 
DIVISION. — In  modern  times  many  scientists  and  philosophers 
have  thought  it  possible  to  explain  the  order  and  course  of  nature, 
the  whole  cosmic  process  and  the  entire  universe  of  our  experience, 
by  an  appeal  to  the  operation  of  efficient  causes.  Espousing  a  me- 
chanical, as  opposed  to  a  teleological,  conception  of  the  universe, 
they  have  denied  or  ignored  all  influence  of  purpose,  and  eschewed 
all  study  of  final  causes.  Furthermore,  misconceiving  or  neglect- 
ing the  category  of  substance,  and  the  doctrine  of  substantial  change, 
they  find  no  place  in  their  speculations  for  any  consideration  of 
formal 'and  material  causes.  Yet  without  final,  formal  and  material 
causes,  so  fully  analysed  by  Aristotle  *  and  the  scholastics,  no  satis- 
factory explanation  of  the  world  of  our  experience  can  possibly  be 
found.  Let  us  therefore  commence  by  outlining  the  traditional 
fourfold  division  of  causes. 

We  have  seen  already  that  change  involves  composition  or 
compositeness  in  the  thing  that  is  subject  to  change.  Hence 
two  intrinsic  principles  contribute  to  the  constitution  of  such  a 
thing,  the  one  a  passive,  determinable  principle,  its  material  cause, 
the  other  an  active,  determining  principle,  its  formal  cause. 
Some  changes  in  material  things  are  superficial,  not  reaching  to 
the  substance  itself  of  the  thing ;  these  are  accidental^  involving 
the  union  of  some  accidental "  form  "  with  the  concrete  pre-existing 
substance  as  material  (materia  "secunda"}.  Others  are  more 
profound,  changes  of  the  substance  itself;  these  are  substantial, 
involving  the  union  of  a  new  substantial  "  form  "  with  the  primal 
material  principal  (materia  "  prima  ")  of  the  substance  undergoing 
the  change.  But  whether  the  change  be  substantial  or  accidental 
we  can  always  distinguish  in  the  resulting  composite  thing  two 
intrinsic  constitutive  principles,  its  formal  cause  and  its  material 
cause.  The  agencies  in  nature  which,  by  their  activity,  bring 
about  change,  are  efficient  causes.  Finally,  since  it  is  an  un- 
deniable fact  that  there  is  order  in  the  universe,  that  its  pro- 
cesses give  evidence  of  regularity ',  of  operation  according  to  law, 
that  the  cosmos  reveals  a  harmonious  co-ordination  of  manifold 
agencies  and  a  subordination  of  means  to  ends,  it  follows  that 
there  must  be  working  in  and  through  all  nature  a  directive 
principle,  a  principle  of  plan  or  design,  a  principle  according  to 
which  those  manifold  agencies  work  together  in  fulfilment  of  a 

1  Cf.  Physic.,  Lib.  ii.,  cap.  3 ;  Metaph.,  Lib.  i.,  cap.  3  ;  v.,  cap.  2. 


362  ONTOLOGY 

purpose,  for  the  attainment  of  ends.     Hence  the  reality  of  a  fourth 
class  of  causes,  final  causes. 

The  separate  influence  of  each  of  those  four  kinds  of  cause 
can  be  clearly  illustrated  by  reference  to  the  production  of  any 
work  of  art.  When,  for  instance,  a  sculptor  chisels  a  statue  from 
a  block  of  marble,  the  latter  is  the  material  cause  (materia  secundd] 
of  the  statue,  the  form  which  he  induces  on  it  by  his  labour  is  the 
formal  cause  (forma  accidentalis),  the  sculptor  himself  as  agent  is 
the  efficient  cause,  and  the  motive  from  which  he  works — money 
fame,  esthetic  pleasure,  etc. — is  the  final  cause. 

The  formal  and  material  causes  are  intrinsic  to  the  effect ; 
they  constitute  the  effect  in  facto  esse,  the  distinction  of  each  from 
the  latter  being  an  inadequate  real  distinction.  It  is  not  so  usual 
nowadays  to  call  these  intrinsic  constitutive  principles  of  things 
causes  of  the  latter;  but  they  verify  the  general  definition  of 
cause.  The  other  two  causes,  the  efficient  and  the  final,  are* 
extrinsic  to  the  effect,  and  really  and  adequately  distinct  from  it,1 
extrinsic  principles  of  its  production,  its  fieri. 

This  classification  of  causes  is  adequate  ; 2  it  answers  all  the 
questions  that  can  be  asked  in  explanation  of  the  production  of 
any  effect :  a  quo  ?  ex  quo?  per  quid?  propter  quid?  Nor  is 
there  any  sort  of  cause  which  cannot  be  brought  under  some 
one  or  other  of  those  four  heads.  What  is  called  an  "  exemplar 
cause,"  causa  exemplaris^  i.e.  the  ideal  or  model  or  plan  in  the 
mind  of  an  intelligent  agent,  according  to  which  he  aims  and 
strives  to  execute  his  work,  may  be  regarded  as  an  extrinsic 
formal  cause ;  or  again,  in  so  far  as  it  aids  and  equips  the  agent 
for  his  task,  an  efficient  cause  ;  or,  again,  in  so  far  as  it  represents 
a  good  to  be  realized,  a  final  cause.3 

1  i.e.  from  the  effect  considered  formally  as  a  term  of  the  activity  ;  in  the  case 
of  immanent  activity,  as,  e.g.  thought  or  volition,  where  the  effect  remains  within  the 
agent  (as  a  verbum  mentale  or  other  mental  term),  uniting  with  the  concrete  reality 
of  the  latter,  the  effect  is  not  adequately  distinct  from  the  agent  as  affected  by  this 
term  or  product. 

2C/.  ST.  THOMAS,  In  Physic.,  ii.,  lect.  10 :  "  Necesse  est  quatuor  essecausas  : 
quia  cum  causa  sit,  ad  quam  sequitur  esse  alterius,  esse  ejus  quod  habet  causam 
potest  considerari  dupliciter  :  uno  modo  absolute,  et  sic  causa  essendi  est  forma  per 
quam  aliquid  est  ens  in  actu  ;  alio  modo  secundum  quod  de  potentia  ente  fit  actu 
ens :  et  quia  omne  quod  est  in  potentia,  reducitur  ad  actum  per  id  quod  est  actu 
ens,  ex  hoc  necesse  est  esse  duas  alias  causas,  scilicet  materiam,  et  agentem 
quod  reducit  materiam  de  potentia  in  actum.  Actio  autem  agentis  ad  aliquod  de- 
terminatum  tendit,  sicut  ab  aliquo  determinate  principio  procedit ;  nam  omne  agens 
agit  quod  est  sibi  conveniens.  Id  autem  ad  quod  intendit  actio  agentis  dicitur 
causa  finalis.  Sic  igitur  necesse  est  esse  causas  quatuor." 

8  Cf.  MURCIER,  op.  cit.,  §§  247-8. 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  363 

The  objects  of  our  knowledge  are  in  a  true  sense  causes  of 
our  knowledge :  any  such  object  may  be  regarded  as  an  efficient 
cause,  both  physical  and  moral,  of  this  knowledge,  in  so  far  as  by 
its  action  on  our  minds  it  determines  the  activity  of  our  cognitive 
faculties  ;  or,  again,  as  a  final  cause,  inasmuch  as  it  is  the  end  and 
aim  of  the  knowledge. 

The  essence  of  the  soul  is,  as  we  have  seen  (69),  not  exactly 
an  efficient  cause  of  the  faculties  which  are  its  properties ;  but  it 
is  their  final  cause,  inasmuch  as  their  raison  d'etre  is  to  perfect  it ; 
and  their  subjective  or  material  cause,  inasmuch  as  it  is  the  seat 
and  support  of  these  faculties. 

The  fourfold  division  is  analogical,  not  univocal  :  though  the 
matter,  the  form,  the  agent,  and  the  end  or  purpose,  all  con- 
tribute positively  to  the  production  of  the  effect,  it  is  clear  that 
the  character  of  the  causal  influence  is  widely  different  in  each 
case. 

Again,  its  members  do  not  demand  distinct  subjects :  all  four 
classes  of  cause  may  be  verified  in  the  same  subject.  For  in- 
stance, the  human  soul  is  a  formal  cause  in  regard  to  the  com- 
posite human  individual,  a  material  cause  in  regard  to  its  habits, 
an  efficient  cause  in  regard  to  its  acts,  and  a  final  cause  in  regard 
to  its  faculties. 

Furthermore,  the  fourfold  division  is  not  an  immediate 
division,  for  it  follows  the  division  of  cause  in  general  into 
intrinsic  and  extrinsic  causes.  Finally,  it  is  a  division  of  the 
causes  which  we  find  to  be  operative  in  the  universe.  But  the 
philosophical  study  of  the  universe  will  lead  us  gradually  to  the 
conviction  that  itself  and  all  the  causes  in  it  are  themselves  con- 
tingent^ themselves  caused  by  and  dependent  on,  a  Cause  outside 
or  extrinsic  to  the  universe,  a  First,  Uncaused,  Uncreated,  Self- 
Existent,  Necessary  Cause  (Causa  Prima,  Increatd],  at  once  the 
efficient  and  final  cause  of  all  things.  In  contrast  with  this  Un- 
created, First  Cause,  all  the  other  causes  we  have  now  to  in- 
vestigate are  called  created  or  second  causes  (causae  secundae, 
creatae). 

A  cause  may  be  either  total,  adequate,  or  partial,  inade- 
quate, according  as  the  effect  is  due  to  its  influence  solely,  or 
to  its  influence  in  conjunction  with,  or  dependence  on,  the 
influence  of  some  other  cause  or  causes  of  the  same  order.  A 
created  cause,  therefore,  is  a  total  cause  if  the  effect  is  due  to 
its  influence  independently  of  other  created  causes ;  though  of 


364  ONTOLOGY 

course  all  created  causes  are  dependent,  both  as  to  their  existence 
and  as  to  their  causality,  on  the  influence  of  the  First  Cause. 
Without  the  activity  of  created  efficient  and  final  causes  the  First 
Cause  can  accomplish  directly  whatever  these  can  accomplish — 
except  their  very  causality  itself,  which  cannot  be  actualized 
without  them,  but  for  which  He  can  supply  eminenter.  Similarly, 
while  it  is  incompatible  with  His  Infinite  Perfection  that  He  dis- 
charge the  function  of  material  or  formal  cause  of  finite  com- 
posite things,  He  can  immediately  create  these  latter  by  the 
simultaneous  production  (ex  nihild)  arid  union  of  their  material 
and  formal  principles. 

A  cause  is  said  to  be  in  actu  secundo  when  it  is  actually  ex- 
ercising its  causal  influence.  Antecedently  to  such  exercise,  at 
least  prioritate  naturae ',  it  is  said  to  be  in  actuprimo :  when  it 
has  the  expedite  power  to  discharge  its  function  as  cause  it  is  in 
actu  pri mo  proximo,  while  if  its  power  is  in  any  way  incomplete, 
hampered  or  unready,  it  is  in  actu  primo  remoto. 

Many  other  divisions  of  cause,  subordinate  to  the  Aristotelian 
division,  will  be  explained  in  connexion  with  the  members  of 
this  latter. 

96.  MATERIAL  AND  FORMAL  CAUSES. — These  are  properly 
subject-matter  for  Cosmology.  We  will  therefore  very  briefly 
supplement  what  has  been  said  already  concerning  them  in  con- 
nexion with  the  doctrine  of  Change  (ch.  ii.).  By  a  material  cause 
we  mean  that  out  of  which  anything  is  made :  id  ex  quo  aliquid  fit. 
Matter  is  correlative  with  form  :  from  the  union  of  these  there 
results  a  composite  reality  endowed  with  either  essential  or 
accidental  unity — with  the  former  if  the  material  principle  be  ab- 
solutely indeterminate  and  the  correlative  form  substantial, 
with  the  latter  if  the  material  principle  be  some  actually  existing  in- 
dividual reality  and  the  form  some  supervening  accident.  Properly 
speaking  only  corporeal  substances  have  material  causes,1  but  the 
term  "  material  cause  "  is  used  in  an  extended  sense  to  signify  any 
potential,  passive,  receptive  subject  of  formative  or  actuating 
principles :  thus  the  soul  is  the  subjective  or  material  cause  of 
its  faculties  and  habits  ;  essence  of  existence  \genus  of  differentia, 
etc. 

1  Certain  medieval  scholastics,  especially  of  the  Franciscan  School,  regarded 
spiritual  substances  as  having  in  their  constitution  a  certain  potential,  determinable 
principle,  which  they  called  "  materia  ".  St.  Thomas,  without  objecting  to  the  de- 
signation, insisted  that  such  potential  principle  cannot  be  the  same  as  the  materia 
prima  of  corporeal  substances  (cf.  De  Substantis  Separatis,  ch.  vii.). 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  365 

In  what  does  the  positive  causal  influence  of  a  material  cause 
consist  ?  How  does  it  contribute  positively  to  the  actualization 
of  the  composite  reality  of  which  it  is  the  material  cause  ?  It 
receives  and  unites  with  the  form  which  is  educed  from  its  poten- 
tiality by  the  action  of  efficient  causes,  and  thus  contributes  to 
the  generation  of  the  concrete,  composite  individual  reality.1 

It  is  by  reason  of  the  causality  of  the  formal  cause  that  we 
speak  of  a  thing  being  formally  such  or  such.  As  correlative 
of  material  cause  it  finds  its  proper  application  in  reference  to 
the  constitution  of  corporeal  things.  The  formative  principle, 
called  forma  substantiates,  which  actuates,  determines,  specifies  the 
material  principle,  and  by  union  with  the  latter  constitutes  an 
individual  corporeal  substance  of  a  definite  kind,  is  the  (substantial) 
formal  cause  of  this  composite  substance.2  The  material  principle 
of  corporeal  things  is  of  itself  indifferent  to  any  species  of  body ; 
it  is  the  form  that  removes  this  indefiniteness  and  determines  the 
matter,  by  its  union  with  the  latter,  to  constitute  a  definite  type 
of  corporeal  substance.3  The  existence  of  different  species  of 
living  organisms  and  different  types  of  inorganic  matter  in 
the  universe  implies  in  the  constitution  of  these  things  a  com- 
mon material  principle,  materia  prima^  and  a  multiplicity  of 
differentiating,  specifying,  formative  principles,  formae  substan- 
tiales.  That  the  distinction  between  these  two  principles  in  the 
constitution  of  any  individual  corporeal  substance,  whether  living 
or  inorganic,  is  not  merely  a  virtual  distinction  between  meta- 
physical (generic  and  specific)  grades  of  being  in  the  individual, 
but  a  real  distinction  between  separable  entities,  is  a  scholastic 
thesis  established  in  the  Special  Metaphysics  of  the  organic  and 
inorganic  domains  of  the  universe.4 

1Cf.  ST.  THOMAS:  "Actio  est  actus  activi  et  passio  est  actus  passivi "  (iii. 
Physic.,  1.  5) ;  "  Materia  non  fit  causa  in  actu  nisi  secundum  quod  alteratur  et  mut- 
atur"  (i.  Contra  Gentes,  xvii.) ;  "Materia  est  causa  formae,  inquantum  forma  non 
est  nisi  in  materia  "  (De  Princip.  Naturae). 

2  Cf.  ST.  THOMAS,  De  Princip.  Naturae,  ibid. :  " .  .  .  et  similiter  forma  est  causa 
materiae,  inquantum  materia  non  habet  esse  in  actu  nisi  per  formam  ;  materia  enim 
et  forma  dicuntur  relative  ad  invicem  ;  dicuntur  etiam   relative  ad  compositum, 
sicut  pars  ad  totum  ". 

3  "  Materia  cum  sit  infinitarum  formarum  determinatur   per  formam,  et  per 
earn  consequitur  aliquam  speciem." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.,  i.,  q.  vii.,  art.  i. 

4  To  Special  Metaphysics  also  belongs  the  controverted  question  whether  or  not 
a  plurality  of  really  distinct  substantial  forms  can  enter  into  the  constitution  of  an 
individual  corporeal  substance.     When  we  classify  corporeal  things  into  genera  and 
species  according  to  their  natural  kinds  (cf.  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §  67),  these  latter  are 
determined  by  the  formae  substantiates  of  the  things  classified,  and  are  called  infimce 
species.     Numerically  distinct  individuals  which  have  (conceptually)  the  same  forma 


366  ONTOLOGY 

Since  the  form  is  a  perfecting,  actuating  principle,  the  term  is 
often  used  synonymously  with  actus,  actuality.  And  since  besides 
the  essential  perfection  which  a  being  has  by  virtue  of  its  sub- 
stantial form  it  may  have  accidental  perfections  by  reason  of 
supervening  accidental  forms,  these,  too,  are  formal  causes. 

In  what  does  the  causal  influence  of  the  formal  cause  consist  ? 
In  communicating  itself  intrinsically  to  the  material  principle  or 
passive  subject  from  whose  potentiality  it  is  evoked  by  the  action 
of  efficient  causes ;  in  actuating  that  potentiality  by  intrinsic 
union  therewith,  and  thus  determining  the  individual  subject  to 
be  actually  or  formally  an  individual  of  such  or  such  a  kind. 

The  material  and  formal  causes  are  intrinsic  principles  of  the 
constitution  of  things.  We  next  pass  to  an  analysis  of  the  two 
extrinsic  causes,  and  firstly  of  the  efficient  cause  and  its  causality. 
97.  EFFICIENT  CAUSE;  TRADITIONAL  CONCEPT  EXPLAINED. — 
By  efficient  cause  we  understand  that  by  which  anything  takes 
place,  happens,  occurs  :  id  a  quo  aliquid  fit.  The  world  of  our 
external  and  internal  experience  is  the  scene  of  incessant  changes  : 
men  and  things  not  only  are,  but  are  constantly  becoming.  Now 
every  such  change  is  originated  by  some  active  principle,  and 

substantiate,  fall  into  the  same  infima  species  ;  while  if  such  individuals  have  (con- 
ceptually and  numerically)  distinct  formae  substantiates  they  fall  into  distinct  in- 
fimae species  of  some  higher  common  genus.  The  wider  the  generic  concept  the 
larger  the  group  of  individuals  which  it  unifies :  it  is  a  principle  of  conceptual  unity, 
i.e.  of  universality.  The  objects  of  our  generic,  differential,  and  specific  concepts, 
throughout  this  process  of  classification,  are  only  virtually  distinct  metaphysical 
grades  of  being  in  the  individuals.  Now  if  the  forma  substantiates  which  yields  the 
unifying  concept  of  the  species  infima  for  the  individuals,  and  the  material  principle 
which  is  the  ground  of  the  numerical  distinction  between  these  latter,  were  likewise 
regarded  by  the  scholastics  as  being  merely  virtually  distinct  metaphysical  grades 
of  being,  in  each  individual,  then  the  question  of  a  plurality  of  really  distinct  forms 
in  one  and  the  same  individual  would  have  no  meaning  :  all  "  forms  "  in  the  latter 
would  be  only  virtually  distinct  from  one  another  and  from  the  material  principle. 
But  the  scholastics  did  not  conceive  that  the  real  ground  for  grouping  individuals 
into  species  infimae  was  the  same  as  that  for  grouping  these  latter  into  wider  genera. 
They  regarded  the  relation  between  the  forma  substantialis  and  the  materia  prima  in 
the  individual  as  quite  different  from  that  between  the  generic  and  specific  grades  of 
being  in  the  individual  (cf.  supra,  §  38 ;  Science  of  Logic,  i.,  §  44 ;  JOSEPH,  Introduction 
to  Logic,  pp.  93-6).  While  they  considered  the  latter  a  relation  of  virtual  distinc- 
tion they  held  the  former  to  be  one  of  real  distinction.  And  while  they  recognized 
the  concept  of  the  species  infimae  to  be  a  principle  of  conceptual  unity  in  grouping 
the  individuals  together  mentally,  St.  Thomas  emphasized  especially  the  role  of 
the  forma  substantialis  (on  which  that  concept  was  founded)  as  a  principle  of  real 
unity  in  the  individual:  "Ab  eodam  habet  res  esse  et  unitatem.  Manifestum  est 
autem  quod  res  habet  esse  per  formam.  Unde  et  per  formam  res  habet  unitatem  " 
(Quodlib.  i.,  art.  6).  If  we  accept  this  doctrine  of  St.  Thomas  the  arguments  which 
he  bases  on  it  against  the  possibility  of  a  plurality  of  distinct  substantial  forms  in 
fhe  same  corporeal  individual  are  unanswerable  (Cf.  MERCIER,  Ontologie,  §  215). 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  367 

this  we  call  the  efficient  cause  of  the  change.     Aristotle  called  it 
TO  KiV7]TiKov  or  T)  ap^rj  KiwrjTiKr),  the  kinetic  or  moving  principle ; 
or  again,  dp^r)  /ct^o-eo)?  ^  //.eTa/SoXr}?  eV  erepa),  principium  motus 
vel  mutationis  in  alio,   "the  principle  of  motion  or  change  in 
some  other  thing  ".     The  result  achieved  by  this  change,  the 
actualized  potentiality,  is  called  the  effect ;  the  causality  itself  of 
the  efficient  cause  is  called    action  (TTOLTJO-K}),   motion,  change — 
and,   from    the  point    of   view  of   the  effect,  passio   (iraBrjcn^). 
The  perfection  or  endowment  whereby  an  efficient  cause  acts, 
i.e.  its  efficiency  (eVe/jyeta),  is  called  active  power  (potentia  seu  vir- 
tus activa] ;  it  is  also  called  force  or  potential  energy  in  reference 
to    inanimate   agents,  faculty  in    reference   to    animate   agents, 
especially  men  and  animals.     This  active  power  of  an  efficient 
cause  or  agent  is  to  be  carefully  distinguished  from  the  passive 
potentiality  acted    upon  and    undergoing  change.      The  former 
connotes  a  perfection,  the  latter  an  imperfection  :  unumquodque 
agit  inquantum  est  in  actu,  patitur  vero  inquantum  est  in  potentia. 
The  scope  of  the  active  power  of  a  cause  is  the  measure  of  its 
actuality,  of  its  perfection  in  the  scale  of  reality ;  while  the  ex- 
tent of  the  passive  potentiality  of  a  pattens  is  a  measure  of  its 
relative  imperfection.     The  actuation  of  the  former  is  actio,  that 
of  the  latter  passio.     The  point  of  ontological  connexion  of  the 
two  potentiae  is  the  change  (motusy  KLV^O-L^),  this  being  at  once 
the  formal  perfecting  of  the  passive  potentiality  in  the  patiens  or 
effect,  and  the  immediate  term  of  the  efficiency  or  active  power  of 
the  agens  or  cause.    Actio  andpasszo,  therefore,  are  not  expressions 
of  one  and  the  same  concept ;  they  express  two  distinct  concepts 
of  one  and  the  same  reality,  viz.  the  change  :  actio  et passio  sunt 
idem  numero  motus.     This  change  takes  place  formally  in    the 
subject  upon  which  the  efficient  cause  acts,  for  it  is  an  actuation 
of  the  potentiality  of  the  former  under  the  influence  of  the  latter : 
rj  fcivijcri,?  eV  roS  Kivrjra)  •  eWeXe%aa  yap  ean  TOVTOV.      Considered 
in  the  potentiality  of  this  subject — "  TO  rovSe  eV  ToSSe  :  hujus  in  hoc" 
— it  is  called  passio.     Considered  as  a  term  of  the  active  power 
of  the  cause — "  rovBe  VTTO  rovSe  :  hujus  per  hoc" — it  is  called  actio. 
The  fact  that  actio  andflassio  are  really  and  objectively  one 
and  the  same  motus  does  not    militate  against   their  being  re- 
garded as  two  separate  supreme  categories,  for  they  are  objects 
of  distinct   concepts,1  and  this  is  sufficient  to  constitute  them 
distinct  categories  (60). 

1 "  Idem  actus  secundum  rem  est  duorum  secundum  diversam  rationem :  agentis 
quidem,  secundum  quod  est  ab  eo,  patientis  autem,  secundum  quod  est  in  ipso.  .  . 


368  ONTOLOGY 

Doubts  are  sometimes  raised,  as  St.  Thomas  remarks,1  about 
the  assertion  that  the  action  of  an  agent  is  not  formally  in  the 
latter  but  in  the  pattens :  actio  fit  in  passo.  It  is  clear,  however, 
he  continues,  that  the  action  is  formally  in  the  pattens  for  it  is  the 
actuation  not  of  any  potentiality  of  the  agent,  but  of  the  passive 
potentiality  of  the  pattens  :  it  is  in  the  latter  that  the  motus  or 
change,  which  is  both  actio  and  passio^  takes  place,  dependently  of 
course  on  the  influence  of  the  agent,  or  efficient  cause  of  the  change. 
The  active  power  of  an  efficient  cause  is  an  index  of  the  latter's 
actuality ;  the  exercise  of  this  power  (i.e.  action)  does  not  for- 
mally perfect  the  agent,  for  it  is  not  an  actuation  of  any  passive 
potentiality  of  the  latter;  it  formally  perfects  the  pattens.  Only 
immanent  action  perfects  the  agent,  and  then  not  as  agent  but  as 
pattens  or  receiver  of  the  actuality  effected  by  the  action  (cf.  103 
infra}. 

We  may,  then,  define  efficient  cause  &$>  the  extrinsic  principle  of 
the  change  or  production  of  anything  by  means  of  action  :  princi- 
pium  extrinsicum  a  quo  fluit  motus  vel  productio  rei  mediante  ac- 
tione. 

It  is  a  "  first "  principle  as  compared  with  material  and  for- 
mal causes  for  its  influence  is  obviously  prior  in  nature  to  theirs  ; 
also  as  compared  with  the  other  extrinsic  cause,  the  final  cause, 
in  ordine  executionis,  not,  however,  in  or  dine  intentionis.  The 
"  end,"  not  as  realized  but  as  realizable,  not  in  execution  but  in 
intention,  discharges  its  function  and  exerts  its  influence  as  "  final 
cause"  and  in  this  order  the  final  cause,  as  will  appear  later,  is  the 
first  of  all  causes :  finis  est  ultimus  in  executione  sed  primus  in  inten- 
tione. 

"  Change  or  production,"  in  the  definition,  is  to  be  under- 
stood not  in  the  strict  sense  in  which  it  presupposes  an  existing 

Ex  eo  quod  actio  et  passio  sunt  unus  motus  non  sequitur  quod  actio  et  passio,  vel 
doctio  et  doctrina,  sint  idem ;  sed  quod  motus  cui  inest  utrumque  eorum,  sit  idem. 
Qui  quidem  motus  secundum  unam  rationem  est  actio,  et  secundum  aliam  rationem 
est  passio ;  alterum  enim  est  secundum  rationem  esse  actus  hujus,  ut  in  hoc,  et  esse 
actus  hujus,  ut  ab  hoc ;  motus  autem  dicitur  actio  secundum  quod  est  actus  agentis 
ut  ab  hoc ;  dicitur  autem  passio  secundum  quod  est  actus  patientis  ut  in  hoc.  Et 
sic  patet  quod  licet  motus  sit  idem  moventis  et  moti,  propter  hoc  quod  abstrahit 
ab  utraque  ratione  :  tamen  actio  et  passio  diflferunt  propter  hoc  quod  diversas  rationes 
in  sua  significatione  habent." — ST.  THOMAS,  In  Phys.,  iii.  1.  5. 

luSolet  dubium  esse  apud  quosdam,  utrum  motus  sit  in  movente,  aut  in  mo- 
bili.  .  .  .  Sed  manifestum  est  quod  actus  cujuslibet  est  in  eo  cujus  est  actus  ;  actus 
autem  motus  est  in  mobili,  cum  sit  actus  mobilis,  causatus  tamen  in  eo  a  movente  .  .  . 
cum  motus  sit  actus  existentis  in  potentia,  sequitur  quod  motus  non  sit  actus  alicujus 
inquantum  est  movens,  sed  inquantum  est  mobile." — ibid.,  1.  4. 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  369 

subject  or  material,  but  in  the  wide  sense  in  which  it  includes 
any  production  of  new  reality,  even  creation  or  production  ex 
nihilo. 

"  Action/'  too,  is  to  be  understood  in  the  wide  sense  in  which  it 
includes  the  action  of  the  First  Cause,  which  action  is  really  iden- 
tical with  the  essence  of  the  latter.  We  conceive  creation  after 
the  analogy  of  the  efficient  action  of  created  or  "  second  "  causes  : 
we  have  no  proper  concept  of  the  infinite  perfection  of  the  Divine 
activity.  In  all  created  efficient  causes  not  only  is  the  action  it- 
self, but  also  the  efficiency,  force,  power,  faculty,  which  is  its 
proximate  principle,  really  distinct  from  the  nature  or  essence  of  the 
agent ;  the  former  is  a  substance,  the  latter  an  accident. 

Finally,  the  action  of  a  created  efficient  cause  is  either  transi- 
tive (transient)  or  immanent  (immanens]  according  as  the  change 
wrought  by  the  action  takes  place  in  something  else  (as  when  the 
sun  heats  or  lights  the  earth]  or  in  the  cause  itself  (as  when  a  man 
reasons  or  wills).  In  the  former  case  the  action  perfects  not  the 
agent  but  the  other  thing,  the  pattens  ;  in  the  latter  case  it  per- 
fects the  agent  itself,  agens  and  pattens  being  here  the  same  iden- 
tical concrete  individual.1 

98.  SOME  SCHOLIA  ON  CAUSATION.  THE  PRINCIPLE  OF 
CAUSALITY. — Before  enumerating  the  principal  kinds  of  efficient 
cause,  and  analysing  the  nature  of  efficient  causality,  we  may  set 
down  here  certain  self-evident  axioms  and  aphorisms  concerning 
causation  in  general,  (a)  The  most  important  of  these  is  the 
Principle  of  Causality,  which  has  been  enunciated  in  a  variety 
of  ways  :  Whatever  happens  has  a  cause  ;  Whatever  begins  to  be 
has  a  cause  ;  Whatever  is  contingent  has  a  cause  ;  Nothing  occurs 
without  a  cause.  Not  everything  that  begins  to  be  has  necessarily 
a  material  cause,  or  a  formal  cause,  really  distinct  from  itself. 
For  instance,  simple  spiritual  beings,  like  the  human  soul,  have 
no  material  cause,  nor  any  formal  cause  or  constitutive  principle 
distinct  from  their  essence.  Similarly,  the  whole  universe,  having 
been  created  ex  nihilo,  had  no  pre-existing  material  cause.  All 
the  material  beings,  however,  which  are  produced,  generated, 
brought  into  actual  existence  in  the  course  of  the  incessant  changes 
which  characterize  the  physical  universe,  have  both  material  and 

1  Some  languages  mark  the  distinction  between  these  two  kinds  of  action : 
"  Differt  autemfacere  et  agere  :  quia/acfr'o  est  actio  transiens  in  exteriorem  materiam, 
sicut  aedificare,  secare  et  hujusmodi ;  agere  autem  est  actio  permanenslin  ipso  agente 
sicut  videre,  velle  et  hujusmodi." — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  Theol.  ia«  iia,  q.  Ixvii.,  art. 
4,  c. 

24 


370  ONTOLOGY 

formal  causes.  But  the  Principle  of  Causality  refers  mainly  to 
extrinsic  causes.  It  is  commonly  understood  only  of  efficient 
causes ;  and  only  in  regard  to  these  is  it  self-evident.  We  shall 
see  that  as  a  matter  of  fact  nothing  happens  without  a  final  cause  : 
that  intelligent  purpose  pervades  reality  through  and  through. 
This,  however,  is  a  conclusion,  not  a  principle.  What  is  really 
a  self-evident,  axiomatic,  necessary  principle  is  that  whatever  hap- 
pens has  an  EFFICIENT  cause.  Only  the  Necessary,  Self-Existing, 
Eternal  Being,  has  the  sufficient  reason  of  His  actual  existence  in 
Himself,  in  His  own  essence.  That  any  being  which  is  contingent 
could  exist  independently  of  some  other  actual  being  as  the  cause  of 
this  existence ;  that  it  could  have  come  into  existence  or  begun 
to  exist  from  absolute  nothingness,  or  be  produced  or  brought  into 
actual  existence  without  any  actual  being  to  produce  it ;  or  that,  once 
existing  and  subject  to  change,  it  could  undergo  change  and  have 
its  potentialities  actualized  without  any  actual  being  to  cause  such 
change  (id) — all  this  is  positively  unthinkable  and  absolutely  repug- 
nant to  our  intelligence ;  all  this  our  reason  peremptorily  declares 
to  be  intrinsically  impossible.  Nor  is  there  question  of  a  mere 
psychological  inconceivability,  such  as  might  be  due  to  a  long- 
continued  custom  of  associating  the  idea  of  a  "beginning"  with 
the  idea  of  a  "  cause"  of  this  beginning — as  phenomenists  gener- 
ally contend.1  There  is  question  of  an  impossibility  which 
our  reason  categorically  dictates  to  be  a  real,  ontological  impossi- 
bility. The  Principle  of  Causality  is  therefore  a  necessary,  a  priori, 
self-evident  principle. 

(ft)  Every  effect  must  have  an  adequate  efficient  cause,  i.e.  a 

1  Hume  went  even  farther,  at  least  in  language ;  for  he  alleged  (whether  he 
really  believed  is  another  question)  that  he  could  overcome  the  supposed  merely 
psychological  difficulty,  that  he  could  easily — and,  presumably,  without  doing 
violence  to  his  rational  nature — conceive  a  non-existent  thing  as  coming  into 
existence  without  a  cause  !  He  proclaimed  that  he  could  achieve  the  feat  of 
thinking  what  the  universal  voice  of  mankind  has  declared  to  be  unthinkable  :  an 
absolute  beginning  of  being  from  nothingness.  "  The  knowledge  of  this  relation 
(causality)  is  not,"  he  writes,  "  in  any  instance  attained  by  reasonings  a  priori ;  but 
arises  entirely  from  experience,  when  we  find  that  any  particular  objects  are  con- 
stantly conjoined  with  each  other"  (Works,  ed.  Green  and  Grose,  iv.,  24).  "All 
distinct  ideas  are  separable  from  each  other,  and,  as  the  ideas  of  cause  and  effect 
are  evidently  distinct,  'twill  be  easy  for  us  (!)  to  conceive  any  object  as  non- 
existent this  moment,  and  existent  the  next,  without  conjoining  'to  it  i  the  distinct 
idea  of  a  cause  or  producing  principle"  (Treatise  i  on,  Human  Nature,  p.  381).  On 
this  argument  (?)  even  such  an  ardent  admirer  of  the  pan-phenomenist  as  Huxley 
was,  is  forced  to  remark  that  "  it  is  of  the  circular  sort,  for  the  major  premise,  that 
all  distinct  ideas  are  separable  in  thought,  assumes  the  question  at  issue  "  (HUXLEY'S 
Hume,  p.  122). 


CA  USAL1TY;  CL  AS  SI  PICA  TION  OF  CA  USES  37 1 

cause  sufficiently  perfect,  sufficiently  high  on  the  scale  of  being, 
to  have  the  active  power  to  produce  the  effect  in  question ; 
otherwise  the  effect  would  be  partially  uncaused,  which  is  im- 
possible. 

(r)  An  effect  cannot  as  such  be  actually  more  perfect  than  its 
adequate  (created)  cause.  The  reason  is  that  the  effect  as  such  is 
really  dependent  for  its  actuality  on  its  adequate  created  cause. 
It  derives  its  actuality  from  the  latter.  Now  it  is  inconceivable 
that  an  agent  could  be  the  active,  productive  principle  of  a 
greater  perfection,  a  higher  grade  of  actuality,  than  itself 
possesses.  Whatever  be  the  nature  of  efficient  causality,  actio 
and  passio  (102),  or  of  the  dependence  of  the  produced  actuality 
upon  the  active  power  of  its  adequate  efficient  cause  (10),  the 
reality  of  this  dependence  forbids  us  to  think  that  in  the  natural 
order  of  efficient  causation  a  higher  grade  of  reality  can  be 
actualized  than  the  agent  is  capable  of  actualizing,  or  that  the 
agent  can  naturally  actualize  a  higher  or  more  perfect  grade  of 
reality  than  is  actually  its  own.1  We  must,  however,  bear  in 
mind  that  there  is  question  of  the  adequate  created  cause  of  an 
effect ;  and  that  to  account  fully  for  the  actualization  of  any 
potential  reality  whatsoever  we  are  forced  to  recognize  in  all 
causation  of  created  efficient  causes  the  concursus  of  the  First 
Cause. 

(d)  The  actuality  of  the  effect  is  in  its  adequate  created  cause 
or  causes,  not  actually  and  formally,  but  potentially  or  virtually. 
If  the  cause  produce  an  effect  of  the  same  kind  as  itself  (causa 
"  univoca  "),  as  when  living  organisms  propagate  their  species,  the 
perfection  of  the  effect  is  said  to   be  in  the  cause  equivalently 
(aequivalenter] ;  if  it  produce  an  effect  of  a  different  kind  from 
itself  (causa  "  analoga  "),  as  when  a  sculptor  makes  a  statue,  the 
perfection  of  the  effect    is    said    to  be  in  the  cause  eminently 
(eminenter). 

(e)  Omne  agens  agit  inquantum  est  in  actu.     The  operative 
power  of  a  being  is  in  proportion  to  its  own  actual  perfection : 
the  higher  an  agent  is  on  the  scale  of  reality,  or  in  other  words 
the  more  perfect  its  grade  of  being,  the  higher  and  more  perfect 
will    be   the   effects  achieved    by  the  exercise  of  its  operative 
powers.     In  fact  our  chief  test  of  the  perfection  of  any  nature  is 

1  The  truth  of  this  aphorism  has  been  questioned  quite  recently  in  an  article  in 
the  Revue  neo-scolastique  (Feb.,  1914  :  Cause  et  Effet,  by  Professor  Laminne  of 
Louvain). 

24* 


372  ONTOLOGY 

analysis  of  its  operations.  Hence  the  maxim  so  often  referred 
to  already  : — 

(/)  Operari  sequitur  esse  ;  qualis  est  operatio  talis  est  natura  ; 
modus  operandi  sequitur  modum  essendi.  Operation  is  the  key  to 
nature ;  we  know  what  any  thing  is  by  what  it  does. 

(g)  Nihil  agit  ultra  suam  speciem ;  or,  again,  Omne  agens 
agit  simile  sibi.  These  are  inductive  generalizations  gathered 
from  experience,  and  have  reference  to  the  natural  operation  of 
agents,  especially  in  the  organic  world.  Living  organisms  re- 
produce only  their  own  kind.  Moreover,  every  agency  in  the 
universe  has  operative  powers  of  a  definite  kind  ;  acting  according 
to  its  nature  it  produces  certain  effects  and  these  only ;  others 
it  cannot  produce :  this  is,  in  the  natural  order  of  things,  and 
with  the  natural  concursus  of  the  First  Cause.  But  created 
causes  have  a  passive  obediential  capacity  (potentia  obedientialis) 
whereby  their  nature  can  be  so  elevated  by  the  First  Cause  that 
they  can  produce,  with  His  special,  supernatural  concursus, 
effects  of  an  entirely  higher  order  than  those  within  the  ambit  of 
their  natural  powers.1 

(h)  From  a  known  effect,  of  whatsoever  kind,  we  can  argue 
with  certainty,  a  posteriori,  to  the  existence  of  an  adequate  effi- 
cient cause,  and  to  some  knowledge  of  the  nature  of  such  a  cause.2 
By  virtue  of  the  principle  of  causality  we  can  infer  the  existence 
of  an  adequate  cause  containing  either  equivalently  or  eminently 
all  the  perfections  of  the  effect  in  question. 

99.  CLASSIFICATION  OF  EFFICIENT  CAUSES. — (a)  We  have 
already  referred  to  the  distinction  between  the  First  Cause  and 
Second  or  Created  Causes.  The  former  is  absolutely  independent 
of  all  other  beings  both  as  to  His  power  and  as  to  the  exercise 
of  this  power.  The  latter  are  dependent,  for  both,  upon  the 
former. 

The  distinction  between  a  first,  or  primary,  or  independent 
cause,  and  second,  or  subordinate,  or  dependent  causes  can  be 
understood  not  only  of  causes  universally,  but  also  as  obtaining 
among  created  causes  themselves.  In  general  the  subordination 
of  a  cause  to  a  superior  or  anterior  cause  may  be  either  essential 
or  accidental:  essential,  when  the  second  cause  depends — either 
for  its  existence  or  for  an  indispensable  complement  of  its 

1  Thus,  for  instance,  man,  elevated  by  sanctifying  grace,  can  perform  acts  which 
merit  the  supernatural  reward  of  the  Beatific  Vision. 
2C/.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  231. 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  373 

efficiency — on  the  present  actual  influence  of  the  other  cause ; 
accidental  when  the  second  cause  has  indeed  received  its 
existence  or  efficiency  from  this  other  cause,  but  is  now  no  longer 
dependent,  for  its  existence  or  action,  on  the  latter.  Thus, 
living  organisms  are,  as  causes,  accidentally  subordinate  to  their 
parent  organisms :  they  derived  their  existence  from  the  latter, 
but  are  independent  of  these  when  in  their  maturity  they  con- 
tinue to  exist,  and  live,  and  act  of  themselves  and  for  themselves. 
But  all  creatures,  on  the  other  hand,  are,  as  causes,  essentially 
subordinate  to  the  Creator,  inasmuch  as  they  can  exist  and  act 
only  in  constant  dependence  on  the  ever  present  and  ever  actual 
conserving  and  concurring  influence  of  the  Creator. 

It  is  obvious  that  all  the  members  of  any  series  of  causes 
essentially  subordinate  the  one  to  the  other  must  exist  simultan- 
eously. Whether  such  a  series  could  be  infinite  depends,  there- 
fore, on  the  question  whether  an  actually  infinite  multitude  is 
intrinsically  possible.  This  difficulty  cannot  be  urged  with  such 
force  against  an  infinite  regress  in  causes  accidentally  subordinate 
to  one  another;  for  here  such  a  regress  would  not  involve  an 
actually  infinite  multitude  of  things  existing  simultaneously. 
In  the  case  of  essentially  subordinate  causes,  moreover,  the 
series,  whatever  about  its  infinity,  must  contain,  or  rather  imply 
above  it,  one  cause  which  is  first  in  the  sense  of  being  independent, 
or  exempt  from  the  subordination  characteristic  of  all  the  others. 
And  the  reason  is  obvious  :  Since  no  one  of  them  can  exist  or 
act  except  dependently  on  another,  and  this  on  another,  and  so 
on,  it  is  manifest  that  the  series  cannot  exist  at  all  unless  there 
is  some  one  cause  which,  unlike  all  the  others,  exists  and  acts 
without  such  subordination  or  dependence.  Hence,  in  essentially 
subordinate  causes  an  infinite  regress  is  impossible}-  In  Natural 
Theology  these  considerations  are  of  supreme  importance. 

(b)  An    efficient   cause    may  be   described    as  immanent  or 
transitive  according  as  the  term  of  its  action  remains  within  the 
cause  itself,  or  is  produced  in  something  else.     The  action  of 
the  First  Cause  is  formally  immanent,  being  identical  with  the 
Divine  Nature  itself;  it  is  virtually  transitive  when  it  is  creative, 
or  operative  among  creatures. 

(c)  An  efficient  cause  is  either  a  principal  or  an  instrumental 
cause.     When  two  causes  so  combine  to  produce  an  effect  that 

1  C/.  ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.,  ii.,  cap.  2. 


374  ONTOLOGY 

one  of  them  uses  the  other  the  former  is  called  the  principal  and 
the  latter  the  instrumental  cause.  Thus  I  am  the  principal 
cause  of  the  words  I  am  writing;  my  pen  is  the  instrumental 
cause  of  them.  Such  an  effect  is  always  attributed  to  the 
principal  cause,  not  to  the  instrumental.  The  notion  of  an 
instrument  is  quite  a  familiar  notion.  An  instrument  helps  the 
principal  agent  to  do  what  the  latter  could  not  otherwise  do,  or 
at  least  not  so  easily.  An  instrument  therefore  is  really  a  cause. 
It  contributes  positively  to  the  production  of  the  effect.  How 
does  it  do  so  ?  By  reason  of  its  nature  or  structure  it  influences, 
modifies,  and  directs  in  a  particular  way,  the  efficiency  of  the 
principal  cause.  But  this  property  of  the  instrumental  cause 
comes  into  play  only  when  the  latter  is  being  actually  used  by  a 
principal  cause.  A  pen,  a  saw,  a  hammer,  a  spade,  have  each 
its  own  instrumentality.  The  pen  will  not  cut,  nor  the  saw 
mould  iron,  nor  the  hammer  dig,  nor  the  spade  write,  for  the 
agent  that  uses  them.  Each  will  produce  its  own  kind  of  effect 
when  used  ;  but  none  of  them  will  produce  any  effect  except  when 
used :  though  each  has  in  itself  permanently  and  inherently  the 
power  to  produce  its  own  proper  effect  in  use.1  We  have  instanced 
the  use  of  artificial  instruments.  But  nature  itself  provides  some 
agencies  with  what  may  be  called  natural  instruments.  The 
semen  whereby  living  organisms  propagate  their  kind  is  an 
instance.  In  a  less  proper  sense  the  various  members  of  the 
body  are  called  instruments  of  the  human  person  as  principal 
cause,  "instrumenta  conjuncta". 

The  notion  of  an  instrumental  cause  involves  then  (a)  sub- 
ordination of  the  latter,  in  its  instrumental  activity,  to  a  principal 
cause,  (ft)  incapacity  to  produce  the  effect  otherwise  than  by 
modifying  and  directing  the  influence  of  the  principal  cause. 
This  property  whereby  the  instrumental  cause  modifies  or 
determines  in  a  particular  way  the  influence  of  the  principal 
cause,  is  called  by  St.  Thomas  an  actio  or  operatic  of  the  former  ; 
the  distinction  between  the  principal  and  the  instrumental  cause 
being  that  whereas  the  former  acts  by  virtue  of  a  power  permanently 
inherent  in  it  as  a  natural  perfection,  the  latter  acts  as  an  instru- 


1  C/.  URRABURU,  op.  cit.,  §  392  (p.  1123) :  "  Unde  adaequata  virtus  instrumentalis 
videtur  conflari  ex  naturali  instrument!  virtute  vel  efficacitate  et  ex  virtute  causae 
principalis  sibi  transeunter  addita,  docente  S.  Thoma :  Instrumentum  virtutem 
instrumentalem  acquirit  dupliciter  scilicet  quando  accipitformatn  instrumenti  et  quando 
movetur  a  principal*  agente  ad  effectum  (Summa  TheoL,  Hi.,  q.  xix.,  art.  3,  ad.  2)." 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  375 

ment  only  by  virtue  of  the  transient  motion  which  it  derives 
from  the  principal  cause  which  utilizes  it.1 

We  may,  therefore,  define  an  instrumental  cause  as  one  which, 
when  acting  as  an  instrument,  produces  the  effect  not  by  virtue  of 
its  inherent  power  alone  >  but  by  virtue  of  a  power  communicated  to 
it  by  some  principal  cause  which  acts  through  it.  A  principal 
cause,  on  the  other  hand,  is  one  which  produces  its  effect  by  virtue 
of  an  active  power  permanently  inherent  in  itself. 

The  designations  principal  and  instrumental  are  obviously 
correlative.  Moreover,  all  created  causes  may  be  called  instru- 
mental in  relation  to  the  First  Cause.  For,  not  only  are  they 
dependent  on  the  latter  for  the  conservation  of  their  nature  and 
active  powers ;  they  are  also  dependent,  in  their  action,  in  their 
actual  exercise  of  these  powers,  on  the  First  Cause  (for  the  con- 
cursus  of  the  latter).2  Yet  some  created  causes  have  these  powers 

1  "  Ad  aliquem  effectum  aliquid  operatur  dupliciter.     Uno  modo  sicut  per  se 
agens ;  et  dicitur  per  se  agere  quod  agit  per  aliquam  formam  sibi  inhaerentem  per 
modum  naturae  completae,  sive  habeat  illam  formam  a  se,  sive  ab  alio.  .  .  .  Alio 
modo   aliquid   operatur  ad  effectum   aliquem   instrumentaliter,  quod  quidem  non 
operatur  ad  effectum  per  formam  sibi  inhaerentem,  sed  solum  inquantum  est  motum 
a  per   se  agente.     Haec   est   ratio  instrument},  inquantum  est   instrumentum,  ut 
movcat  motum  ;  unde  sicut  se  habet  forma  completa  ad  per  se  agentem,  ita  se  habet 
motus,  quo  movetur  a  principale  agente,  ad  instrumentum,  sicut  serra  operatur  ad 
scamnum.     Quamvis  enim  serra  habeat  aliquam  actionem  quae  sibi  competit  secun- 
dum  propriam  formam,  ut  divider e  ;    tamen  aliquem  effectum  habet  qui  sibi  non 
competit,  nisi  inquantum  est  mota  ab  artifice,  scilicet  facere  rectam  incisionem,  et 
convenientem  formae  artis  :  et  sic  instrumentum  habet  duas  operationes  ;  unam  quae 
competit  ei  secundam  rationem  propriam ;  aliam  quae  competit  ei  secundam  quod 
est  motum   a  per   se   agente,   quae   transcendit  virtutem  propriae  formae." — De 
Veritate,  q.  xxvii.,  art.  4.     It  is  not  clear,  however,  that  St.  Thomas  regarded  these 
two  "  operationes  "  of  the  instrumental  cause  as  really  distinct,  for  he  says  that  it 
acts  as  an  instrument  (i.e.  modifies  the  efficiency  of  the  principal  cause)  only  by 
exercising  its  own  proper  function  :  "  Omne  agens  instrumentale  exsequitur  actionem 
principalis  agentis  per  aliquam  operationem  propriam,  et  connaturalem  sibi,  sicut 
calor  naturalis  generat  carnem   dissolvendo   et  digerendo,   et  serra  operatur   ad 
factionem  scamni  secando  "  (Contra  Gentes,  ii.,  ch.  xxi.)  :  from  which  he  goes  on  to 
argue  that  no  creature  can  act  even  as  an  instrumental  cause  in  creating. — Cf.  iv. 
Sent.,  Dist.  i.,  q.  i.,  art.  4,  sol.  2. — De  Potentia,  q.  iii.,  art.  7. — Summa  TheoL,  Hi.,  q. 
Ixii.,  art.  i,  ad.  2. 

2  St.  Thomas,  proving  the  necessity  oi  the  Divine  concursus  for  all  created  causes, 
illustrates  the  general  distinction  between  a  principal  and  an  instrumental  cause : 
"  Virtus  naturalis  quae  est  rebus  naturalibus  in  sua  institutione  collata,  inest  eis  ut 
quaedem  forma  habens  esse  ratum  etjirmum  in  natuta.     Sed  id  quod  a  Deo  fit  in  re 
naturali,  quo  actualiter  agat,  est  ut  intentio  sola,  habens  esse  quoddam  incompletum, 
per  modum  quo  .  .  .  virtus  artis  [est]  in  instrument©  aftificis.     Sicut  ergo  securi  per 
artem  dari  potuit  acumen,  ut  esset  forma  in  ea  permanens,  non  autem  dari  ei  potuit 
quod  vis  artis  esset  in  ea  quasi  quaedam  forma  permanens,  nisi  haberet  intellectum ; 
ita  rei  naturali  potuit  conferri  virtus  propria,  ut  forma  in  ipsa  permanens,  non  autem 
V is  qua  agit  ad  esse  ut  instrumentum  primae  causae,  nisi  daretur  ei  quod  esset  uniyer- 


376  ONTOLOGY 

permanently,  and  can  exercise  them  without  subordination  to 
other  creatures  ;  while  others  need,  for  the  exercise  of  their  proper 
functions,  not  only  the  Divine  concursus,  but  also  the  motion 
of  other  creatures.  Hence  the  former  are  rightly  called  principal 
created  causes,  and  the  latter  instrumental  created  causes. 

(d]  Efficient  causes  are  divided  into  free  causes  and  necessary 
causes.  A  free  or  self-determining  cause  is  one  which  is  not  de- 
termined by  its  nature  to  one  line  of  action,  but  has  the  power 
of  choosing,  or  determining  itself,  to  act  or  abstain,  when  all  the 
conditions  requisite  for  acting  are  present.  Man  is  a  free  agent, 
or  free  cause,  of  his  deliberate  actions.  A  necessary  cause,  or 
natural  cause  as  it  is  sometimes  called,  is  one  which  is  determined 
by  its  nature  to  one  invariable  line  of  action^  so  that,  granted  the 
conditions  requisite  for  action,  it  cannot  naturally  abstain  from 
acting  in  that  invariable  manner.  All  the  physical  agencies  of 
the  inorganic  world,  all  plant  and  animal  organisms  beneath 
man  himself,  are  necessary  causes. 

The  freedom  of  the  human  will  is  established  against  deter- 
minism in  Psychology.1  The  difficulties  of  determinists  against 
this  doctrine  are  for  the  most  part  based  on  misconceptions, 
or  on  erroneous  and  gratuitous  assumptions.  We  may  mention 
two  of  them  here.2  Free  activity,  they  say,  would  be  causeless 
activity  :  it  would  violate  the  "  law  of  universal  causation ". 
We  reply  that  free  activity  is  by  no  means  causeless  activity. 
The  free  agent  himself  is  in  the  fullest  and  truest  sense  the  effi- 
cient cause  of  his  free  acts.  It  is  by  his  causal,  efficient  influence 
that  the  act  of  free  choice  is  determined  and  elicited.  Free 
causality  evidently  does  not  violate  the  necessary,  a  priori  prin- 
ciple set  forth  above  under  the  title  of  the  Principle  of  Causality. 
But — they  urge  in  the  second  place — it  violates  the  "  law  of  uni- 
versal causation,"  i.e.  the  law  that  every  event  in  nature  must  be 
the  result  of  some  set  of  phenomenal  antecedents  which  necessitate 
it,  and  which,  therefore,  whenever  verified,  must  produce  this 
result  and  no  other ;  and  by  violating  this  law  it  removes  all 
supposed  "  free  "  activities  from  the  domain  of  that  regularity 

sale  essendi  principium  ;  nee  iterum  virtuti  naturali  conferri  potuit  ut  moveret  seipsam, 
nee  ut  conservaret  se  in  esse :  unde  sicut  patet  quod  instrumento  artificis  conferri 
non  oportuit  quod  operaretur  absque  motu  artis  ;  ita  rei  naturali  conferri  non  potuit 
quod  operaretur  absque  operatione  divina."— QQ.  DD.  DC.  Pot.,  q.  iii.,  art.  7. 

1  C/.  MAKER,  Psychology,  eh.  xix. — MERCIER,  Psychologic,  ii.,  ch.  i.  §  2. 

2  For  a  fuller  treatment  of  this  whole  subject,  cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  Part  iv., 
chs.  iii.,  iv.  ;  Part  v.,  ch.  i. — MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  xix.,  pp.  423-4. 


CAUSALITY;  CLASSIFICATION  OF  CAUSES  377 

and  uniformity  without  which  no  scientific  knowledge  of  such 
phenomena  would  be  possible.  To  this  we  reply,  firstly,  that 
the  law  of  uniform  causation  in  nature,  the  law  which  is  known 
as  the  "  Law  of  the  Uniformity  of  Nature,"  and  which,  under  the 
title  of  the  "  Law  of  Universal  Causation  "  is  confounded  by  de- 
terminists  and  phenomenists  with  the  entirely  distinct  "  Principle 
of  Causality  " — is  not  by  any  means  a  law  of  necessary  causation.1 
The  statement  that  Nature  is  uniform  in  its  activities  is  not  the 
expression  of  an  a  priori,  necessary  truth,  like  the  Principle  of 
Causality.  It  is  a  generalization  from  experience.  And  experi- 
ence testifies  to  the  existence  of  grades  in  this  all-prevailing 
uniformity.  In  the  domain  of  physical  nature  it  is  the  expression 
of  the  Free  Will  of  the  Author  of  Nature,  who  may  miraculously 
derogate  from  this  physical  uniformity  for  higher,  moral  ends.  In 
the  domain  of  deliberate  human  activities  it  is  the  expression  of  that 
less  rigorous  but  no  less  real  uniformity  which  is  dependent  on 
the  free  will  of  man.  And  just  as  the  possibility  of  miracles  in 
the  former  domain  does  not  destroy  the  regularity  on  which  the 
generalizations  of  the  physical  sciences  are  based,  so  neither  does 
the  fact  of  human  free  will  render  worthless  or  unreliable  the 
generalizations  of  the  human  sciences  (ethical,  social,  political, 
economic,  etc.)  about  human  conduct.  Were  the  appearance  of 
miracles  in  the  physical  domain,  or  the  ordinary  play  of  free  will 
in  the  human  domain,  entirely  capricious,  motiveless,  purposeless, 
the  results  would,  of  course,  be  chaotic,  precarious,  unaccount- 
able, unintelligible,  and  scientific  knowledge  of  them  would  be 
impossible  :  for  the  assumption  that  reality  is  the  work  of  intelli- 
gent purpose,  and  is  therefore  a  regular,  orderly  expression  of 
law,  in  other  words,  the  assumption  that  the  universe  is  intelli- 
gible, is  a  prerequisite  condition  for  scientific  knowledge  about 
the  universe.  But  determinists  seem  to  assume  that  Divine 
Providence  and  human  free  will  must  necessarily  imply  that  the 
whole  universe  of  physical  phenomena  and  human  activities 
would  be  an  unintelligible  chaos  ;  and  having  erected  this  philos- 
ophical scarecrow  on  a  gratuitous  assumption  they  think  it  will 
gradually  exorcise  all  belief  in  Divine  Providence  and  human 
freedom  from  the  "scientific"  mind! 

(e)  Efficient  causes  are  either  physical  or  moral.  A  physical 
efficient  cause  is  one  which  produces  its  effect  by  its  own  proper  power 
and  action — whether  immediately  or  by  means  of  an  instrument. 

1C/.  NEWMAN,  Grammar  of  Assent,  Part  i.f  ch.  iv.,  §  i  (5),  (6) ;  §  2,  remark  i. 


378  ONTOLOGY 

For  instance,  the  billiard  player  is  the  physical  cause  of  the 
motion  he  imparts  to  the  balls  by  means  of  the  cue.  A  moral 
cause  is  one  which  produces  its  effect  by  the  representation  of 
something  as  good  or  evil  to  the  mind  of  a  free  agent ;  by  inducing 
the  latter  through  example,  advice,  persuasion,  promises,  threats, 
commands,  entreaties,  etc.,  to  produce  the  effect  in  question.  For 
instance,  a  master  is  the  moral  cause  of  what  his  servant  does  in 
obedience  to  his  commands.  The  motives  set  forth  by  way 
of  inducement  to  the  latter  are  of  course  final  causes  of  the  latter's 
action.  But  the  former,  by  setting  them  forth,  is  the  moral  cause 
of  the  action :  he  is  undoubtedly  more  than  a  mere  condition ; 
he  contributes  positively  and  efficiently  to  the  effect.  His 
physical  causation,  however,  does  not  reach  to  the  effect  itself, 
but  only  to  the  effect  wrought  in  the  mind  of  the  servant  by  his 
command.  It  is  causally  connected  with  the  physical  action  of 
the  servant  by  means  of  an  intermediate  link  which  we  may  call 
mental  or  psychical  causation — actio  "  intentionalis" — the  action  of 
cognition  on  the  mind  of  a  cognitive  agent 

The  agent  employed  by  a  moral  cause  to  produce  an  effect 
physically  may  be  called  an  instrumental  cause  in  a  wide  and  less 
proper  sense  of  this  term,  the  instrumentality  being  moral,  not 
physical.  Only  free  agents  can  be  moral  causes  ;  and  as  a  rule 
they  are  termed  moral  causes  only  when  they  produce  the  effect 
through  the  physical  operation  of  another  free  agent.  What  if 
they  employ  not  free  agents,  nor  yet  inanimate  instruments,  but 
agents  endowed  with  sense  cognition  and  sense  appetite,  to 
produce  effects  ?  If  a  man  set  his  dog  at  another,  is  he  the 
moral  or  the  physical  cause  of  the  injuries  inflicted  by  the  dog? 
That  he  is  the  principal  efficient  cause  is  unquestionable.  But  is 
he  the  principal  physical  cause  and  the  dog  the  instrument  ?  We 
think  it  is  more  proper  to  call  the  principal  efficient  cause  a  moral 
cause  in  all  cases  where  there  intervenes  between  his  physical 
action  and  the  effect  an  intermediate  link  of  "  psychical "  or 
"  intentional "  action,  even  though,  as  in  the  present  example, 
this  psychical  link  is  of  the  sentient,  not  the  intellectual,  order. 

(/)  The  efficient  cause,  like  other  causes,  may  be  either  partial 
or  total,  according  as  it  produces  the  effect  by  co-operation  with 
other  causes,  or  by  itself  alone.  The  aim  of  the  inductive  sciences 
is  to  discover  for  each  kind  of  natural  event  or  phenomenon  the 
"  total  cause  "  in  the  comprehensive  sense  of  the  whole  group  of 
positive  agencies  or  causes  proper,  and  negative  antecedent  and 


CA  US  A  LIT  Y;  CLA  SSIFICA  TION  OF  CA  USES  379 

concomitant  conditions  which  are  indispensable  and  necessitating 
principles  of  the  happening  of  such  kind  of  event.1 

(£•)  We  can  distinguish  between  the  immediate  or  determining, 
the  more  or  less  proximate,  and  the  more  or  less  remote,  efficient 
causes  of  an  event  Thus,  the  application  of  the  fuse  to  the  charge 
of  dynamite  in  a  rock  is  the  immediate  or  determining  cause  of  the 
explosion  which  bursts  the  rock  ;  the  lighting  of  the  fuse,  the 
placing  of  the  charge,  etc.,  the  more  proximate  causes  ;  the  making 
of  the  fuse,  dynamite,  instruments,  etc.,  the  more  remote  causes. 
Again  the  aim  of  the  inductive  sciences  is  to  discover  the  "  total 
proximate  cause"  of  events,2  leaving  the  investigation  of  ultimate 
causes,  as  well  as  the  analysis  of  causality  itself,  to  philosophy. 

(#)  Finally,  we  must  distinguish  between  the  individual  agent 
itself  as  cause  (the  suppositum  or  person  that  acts) ;  the  agent's 
nature  and  active  power  as  causes  ;  and  the  action,  or  exercise  of 
this  power  as  cause.  The  former,  the  individual,  concrete  agent, 
is  the "  principium  quod &g\\.?  and  is  called  the  "  causal  quae". 
The  nature  and  the  active  power  of  the  agent  are  each  a  "  prin- 
cipium quo  agens  agit,"  the  remote  and  the  proximate  principle 
of  action  respectively  ;  and  each  is  called  a  "  causa  utqua  ".  The 
action  of  the  agent  is  the  cause  of  the  effect  in  the  sense  that  the 
actual  production  or  fieri  of  anything  is  the  immediate  cause  of 
this  thing  in  facto  esse.  Corresponding  to  these  distinctions  we 
distinguish  between  the  cause  in  actu  primo  remote,  in  actu  primo 
proximo,  and  in  actu  secundo.  These  distinctions  are  of  no  little 
importance.  By  ignoring  them,  and  by  losing  sight  of  the 
intrinsic  (formal  and  material)  causes  of  natural  phenomena, 
many  modern  scientists  and  philosophers  have  confounded  cause 
and  effect  with  the  process  itself  of  causation,  and  declared  that 
cause  and  effect  are  not  distinct  realities,  but  only  two  mental 
aspects  of  one  and  the  same  reality.3 

The  same  may  be  said  of  all  the  distinctions  so  far  enumerated.  They 
are  absolutely  essential  to  the  formation  of  clear  ideas  on  the  question  of 
causality.  No  term  in  familiar  use  is  of  more  profound  philosophical 
significance,  and  at  the  same  time  more  elastic  and  ambiguous  in  its  popular 
meanings,  than  the  term  cause.  This  is  keenly  felt  in  the  Logic  of  the 
Inductive  Sciences,  where  not  only  the  discovery,  but  the  exact  measurement, 
of  physical  causes,  is  the  goal  of  research. 

"When  we  call  one  thing,"  writes  Mr.  Joseph,4  "the  cause  of  another, 
the  real  relation  between  them  is  not  always  the  same.  .  .  .  We  say  that 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §§  216,  218,  219.  2  ibid.,  §  216. 

3  ibid.,  §  220.  4  Introduction  to  Logic,  pp.  64-5. 


380  ONTOLOGY 

molecular  action  is  the  cause  of  heat,  that  the  heat  of  the  sun  is  the  cause  of 
growth,  that  starvation  is  sometimes  the  cause  of  death,  that  jealousy  is  a 
frequent  cause  of  crime.  We  should  in  the  first  case  maintain  that  cause  and 
effect  are  reciprocally  necessary  ;  no  heat  without  molecular  motion  and  no 
molecular  motion  without  heat.  In  the  second  the  effect  cannot  exist  without 
the  cause,  but  the  cause  may  exist  without  the  effect,  for  the  sun  shines  on 
the  moon  but  nothing  grows  there.  In  the  third  the  cause  cannot  exist 
without  the  effect,  for  starvation  must  produce  death,  but  the  effect  may  exist 
without  the  cause,  since  death  need  not  have  been  produced  by  starvation. 
In  the  fourth  case  we  can  have  the  cause  without  the  effect,  and  also  the 
effect  without  the  cause  ;  for  jealousy  may  exist  without  producing  crime,  and 
crime  may  occur  without  the  motive  of  jealousy.  It  is  plain  then  that  we  do 
not  always  mean  the  same  thing  by  our  words  when  we  say  that  two  things  are 
related  as  cause  and  effect ;  and  anyone  who  would  classify  and  name  the 
various  modes  in  which  two  things  may  be  causally  related  would  do  a  great 
service  to  clear  thinking." 

In  the  popular  acceptation  of  the  term  cause,  the  same  kind  of  event  can 
have  a  plurality  of  (efficient}  causes.  Death,  for  example,  may  be  brought 
about  in  different  cases  by  different  diseases  or  accidents.  But  if  we  understand 
by  the  total  efficient  cause  of  any  given  kind  of  effect  the  sum -total  of  agencies 
and  conditions  which  when  present  necessitate  this  kind  of  an  effect,  and 
which  are  collectively  and  severally  indispensable  for  its  production,  then  it  is 
obvious  that  a  given  kind  of  effect  can  have  only  one  kind  of  such  total  group 
of  antecedents  as  total  cause,  just  as  any  one  individual  effect  can  have  only 
one  individual  total  cause,  viz.  the  one  which  actually  produced  it ;  a  similar 
total  cause  would  produce  a  similar  effect,  but  could  not  produce  the  numeri- 
cally identical  individual  effect  of  the  other  similar  cause.1 

The  medieval  scholastics  discussed  the  question  in  connexion  with  the 
problem  of 'individuation  :  "  Would  Alexander  the  Great  have  been  the  same 
individual  had  he  been  born  of  other  parents  than  Philip  and  Olympia  ?  "  The 
question  is  hardly  intelligible.  The  person  born  of  these  other  parents  might 
indeed  have  been  as  similar  as  you  will  to  the  actual  Alexander  of  history,  but 
would  not  and  could  not  have  been  the  actual  Alexander  of  history.  Nowa- 
days the  question  discussed  in  this  connexion  is  not  so  much  whether  the 
same  kind  of  natural  phenomenon  can  be  produced  by  different  kinds  of  total 
cause — for  the  answer  to  this  question  depends  wholly  on  the  wider  or  the 
narrower  meaning  attached  to  the  term  "  total  cause,"  2 — but  rather  whether 
or  how  far  the  inductive  scientist's  ideal  of  searching  always  for  the  necessita- 
ting and  indispensable  cause  (or,  as  it  is  also  called,  the  "  reciprocating  "  or 
"  commensurate  "  cause)  is  a  practical  ideal. 

1  Cf.  what  was  said  above  (32)  about  the  causal  or  extrinsic,  as  distinct  from  the 
intrinsic,  principle  of  individuation. 

2  "Whenever  science  tries  to  find  the  cause  not  of  a  particular  event,  such  as 
the  French  Revolution  (whose  cause  must  be  as  unique  as  that  event  itself  is),  but 
of  an  event  of  a  kind,  such  as  consumption,  or  commercial  crises,  it  looks  in  the  last 
resort  for  a  commensurate  cause.     What  is  that  exact  state  or  condition  of  the  body, 
given  which  it  must  and  without  which  it  cannot  be  in  consumption  ?     What  are 
those  conditions  in  a  commercial  community,  given  which  there  must  and  without 
which  there  cannot  be  a  commercial  crisis  ?  " — JOSEPH,  op.  cit.,  p.  65.     Cf.  Science 
of  Logic,  ii.,  §  221. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY;  PHENOMENISM  AND  OCCASIONALISM. 

ioo.  OBJECTIVE  VALIDITY  OF  THE  TRADITIONAL  CON- 
CEPT OF  EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY. — We  have  seen  how  modern 
sensists,  phenomenists,  and  positivists  have  doubted  or  denied 
the  power  of  the  human  mind  to  attain  to  a  knowledge  of  any 
objective  reality  corresponding  to  the  category  of  substance 
(§§  6 1  sqq^].  They  treat  in  a  similar  way  the  traditional  con- 
cept of  efficient  causality.  And  in  delivering  their  open  or  veiled 
attacks  on  the  real  validity  of  this  notion  they  have  made  a  mis- 
leading use  of  the  proper  and  legitimate  function  of  the  inductive 
sciences.  The  chief  aim  of  the  natural  scientist  is  to  seek  out 
and  bring  to  light  the  whole  group  of  necessitating  and  indispen- 
sable (phenomenal)  antecedents  of  any  given  kind  of  event,  and  to 
formulate  the  natural  law  of  their  connexion  with  this  kind  of 
event.  There  is  no  particular  objection  to  his  calling  these  ante- 
cedents the  invariable,  or  even  the  necessary  or  necessitating t 
antecedents  of  the  event ;  provided  he  does  not  claim  what  he 
cannot  prove — and  what,  as  we  shall  see  later  (104),  is  not  true, 
viz. — that  the  invariability  or  necessity  of  this  connexion  between 
phenomenal  antecedents  and  consequents  is  wholly  inviolable, 
fatal,  absolute  in  character.  He  may  rightly  claim  for  any  such 
established  connexion  the  hypothetical,  conditional  necessity 
which  characterizes  all  inductively  established  laws  of  physical 
nature.  There  are  such  antecedents  and  consequents  in  the 
universe;  there  are  connexions  between  them  which  are  more 
than  mere  casual  connexions  of  time  sequence,  which  are  con- 
nexions of  physical  law,  inasmuch  as  they  are  connexions  based 
on  the  natures  of  agencies  in  an  orderly  universe,  connexions  of 
these  agencies  with  their  natural  effects.  All  this  is  undeniable. 
Moreover,  so  long  as  the  scientist  confines  himself  to  inferences 
concerning  such  connexions  between  phenomena,  to  inferences 
and  generalizations  based  on  the  assumed  uniformity  of  nature, 
he  is  working  in  his  proper  sphere.  Nay,  even  if  he  chooses  to 

381 


382  ONTOLOGY 

designate  these  groups  of  invariable  phenomenal  antecedents  by 
the  title  of  "  physical  causes  "  we  know  what  he  means  ;  though 
we  perceive  some  danger  of  confusion,  inasmuch  as  we  see  him 
arrogating  to  the  notion  of  regularity  or  uniformity  of  connexion, 
i.e.  to  the  notion  of  physical  law,  a  term,  causality,  which  tradi- 
tionally expressed  something  quite  distinct  from  this,  viz.  the 
notion  of  positive  influence  of  one  thing  on  the  being  or  happen- 
ing of  another.  But  when  phenomenist  philosophers  adopt  this 
usage  we  cannot  feel  reassured  against  the  danger  of  confusion  by 
such  protestations  as  those  of  Mill  in  the  following  passage  : — 1 

I  premise,  then,  that  when  in  the  course  of  this  inquiry  I  speak  of  the 
cause  of  any  phenomenon,  I  do  not  mean  a  cause  which  is  not  itself  a  pheno- 
menon ;  I  make  no  research  into  the  ultimate  or  ontological  cause  of  anything. 
To  adopt  a  distinction  familiar  in  the  writings  of  the  Scotch  metaphysicians,  and 
especially  of  Reid,  the  causes  with  which  I  concern  my  self  are  not  efficient ',  but 
physical  causes.  They  are  causes  in  that  sense  alone,  in  which  one  physical  fact 
is  said  to  be  the  cause  of  another.  Of  the  efficient  causes  of  phenomena,  or 
whether  any  such  causes  exist  at  all  I  am  not  called  upon  to  give  an  opinion. 
The  notion  of  causation  is  deemed,  by  the  schools  of  metaphysics  most  in 
vogue  at  the  present  moment,  to  imply  a  mysterious  and  most  powerful  tie, 
such  as  cannot,  or  at  least  does  not,  exist  between  any  physical  fact  and  that 
other  physical  fact  on  which  it  is  invariably  consequent,  and  which  is  popularly 
termed  its  cause  ;  and  thence  is  deduced  the  supposed  necessity  of  ascending 
higher,  into  the  essences  and  inherent  constitution  of  things,  to  find  the  true 
cause,  the  cause  which  is  not  only  followed  by,  but  actually  produces,  the 
effect.  No  such  necessity  exists  for  the  purposes  of  the  present  inquiry,  nor 
will  any  such  doctrine  be  found  in  the  following  pages.  The  only  notion  of 
a  cause,  which  the  theory  of  induction  requires,  is  such  a  notion  as  can  be 
gained  by  experience.  The  Law  of  Causation,  which  is  the  main  pillar  of  in- 
ductive science,  is  but  the  familiar  truth,  that  invariability  of  succession  is  found 
by  observation  to  obtain  between  every  fact  in  nature  and  some  other  fact 
which  has  preceded  it ;  independently  of  all  considerations  respecting  the 
ultimate  mode  of  production  of  phenomena,  and  of  every  other  question  re- 
garding the  nature  of  "  Things  in  themselves  ". 

This  passage — which  expresses  fairly  well  the  phenomenist 
and  positivist  attitude  in  regard  to  the  reality,  or  at  least  the 
cognoscibility,  of  efficient  causes — fairly  bristles  with  inaccuracies, 
misconceptions,  and  false  insinuations.2  But  we  are  concerned  here 

1  System  of  Logic,  iii.,  v.,  §  2. 

2  For  instance  :  (a)  The  "  ontological  "  or  "  true  "  cause,  which  "  actually  pro- 
duces "  the  effect,  need  not  necessarily  be  the  "  ultimate  "  cause  of  the  latter,    (b) 
A  "  physical  fact  "   can  be  the  cause  of  another  in  the  sense  of  being  the  invariable 
antecedent  (or physical  cause)  of  the  latter,  but  not  "  in  that  sense  alone";  it  may 
also  be  an  efficient  cause  of  the  latter  by  exerting  an  active  influence  on  the  happening 
of  this  latter,    (c)  Whether  or  not  efficiency  is  "  a  mysterious  and  most  powerful  tie," 
at  any  rate  it  does  exist  between  "  physical  facts  "  in  the  universe,    (d)  Its  analysis 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  383 

only  with  the  denial  that  any  notion  of  an  efficient  cause  "  can  be 
gained  from  experience,"  and  the  doubt  consequently  cast  on  the 
objective  validity  of  this  notion.  The  Sensism  which  regards  our 
highest  intellectual  activities  as  mere  organic  associations  of 
sentient  states  of  consciousness,  has  for  its  logical  issue  the  Posi- 
tivism which  contends  that  all  valid  knowledge  is  confined  to  the 
existence  and  time  and  space  relations  of  sense  phenomena.  In 
thus  denying  to  the  mind  all  power  of  attaining  to  a  valid  know- 
ledge of  anything  suprasensible — such  as  substance,  power,  force, 
efficient  cause,  etc. — Positivism  passes  over  into  Agnosticism. 

In  refutation  of  this  philosophy,  in  so  far  as  it  denies  that  we 
have  any  grounds  in  experience  for  believing  in  the  real  existence 
of  efficient  causes,  we  may  set  down  in  the  first  place  this  universal 
belief  itself  of  the  human  race  that  there  are  in  the  universe  effi- 
cient causes  of  the  events  that  happen  in  it.  Men  universally 
believe  that  they  themselves  as  agents  contribute  by  a  real  and 
positive  influence  to  the  actual  occurrence  of  their  own  thoughts, 
reasonings,  wishes,  desires,  sensations  ;  that  their  mental  resolves 
to  speak,  walk,  write,  eat,  or  perform  any  other  external,  bodily 

reveals  not  a"  supposed  necessity  of  ascending.  .  .  to  .  .  .the  true  cause,  .  .  .which 
.  .  .  produces  the  effect,"  as  if  the  proximate  causes  did  not  also  truly  produce  the  latter; 
but  a  real  necessity  of  ascending  to  a  First  Cause  as  the  source  and  support  and  comple- 
ment of  the  real  efficiency  of  these  proximate  causes,  (e)  A  merely  logical  theory  of 
Induction  does  not  indeed  demand  any  inquiry  either  into  the  efficiency  of  natural 
agencies,  or  into  the  nature  and  grounds  of  the  "  invariability  "  or  "  necessity  "  or 
"  law  "  whereby  these  are  connected  with  their  effects.  But  a  philosophical  theory  of 
Induction  does  imply  such  inquiries.  And  here  phenomenist  writers  like  Mill  have 
laid  themselves  open  to  two  accusations.  For  while  professing  merely  to  abstract 
from  the  problem  of  efficiency  they  have  tried  equivalently  to  deny  its  existence  by 
proclaiming  it  superfluous  and  insoluble,  besides  consciously  or  unconsciously  misre- 
presenting it.  And  similarly,  in  dealing  with  the  invariability  of  causal  sequences  in 
the  universe,  with  the  necessary  character  of  its  physical  laws,  they  have  miscon- 
ceived this  necessity  as  being  mechanical,  fatal,  absolutely  inviolable  ;  and  have 
wrongly  proclaimed  its  ultimate  grounds  to  be  unknowable  (Agnosticism).  Cf.  infra, 
§  104  ;  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  Part  IV.,  chs.  iii.,  iv.,  and  v. ;  Part  V.,  ch.  i.  Thus,  while 
eschewing  the  genuine  Metaphysics,  which  seeks  the  real  nature  and  causes  of  the 
world  of  our  experience,  as  superfluous  and  futile,  they  have  substituted  for  it  a 
masked  and  spurious  metaphysics  which  they  have  wrongly  fathered  on  Physical 
Science :  a  mass  of  more  or  less  superficial  speculations  which  have  not  even  the 
merit  of  consistency.  No  philosopher,  starting  with  their  views  on  the  nature  of  the 
human  mind,  can  consistently  claim  for  the  latter  any  really  valid  or  reliable  know- 
ledge of  laws,  any  more  than  of  causes.  For  the  knowledge  of  a  law,  even  as  a 
generalized  fact,  is  a  knowledge  that  claims  to  pass  beyond  the  limits  of  the  indi- 
vidual's present  and  remembered  experiences.  But  there  can  be  no  rational  justi- 
fication, whether  psychological  or  ontological,  for  the  certain  reliability  of  such  a  step, 
in  the  philosophy  which  logically  reduces  all  certain  knowledge  to  the  mere  aware- 
ness of  a  flow  of  successive  sensations  supposed  to  constitute  the  total  content  of  the 
individual  consciousness  and  the  total  reality  of  human  experience. 


384  ONTOLOGY 

works  do  really,  positively,  and  efficiently  produce  or  cause  those 
works ;  that  external  phenomena  have  a  real  influence  on  hap- 
penings in  their  own  bodies,  that  fire  burns  them  and  food 
nourishes  them ;  that  external  phenomena  also  have  a  real  and 
positive  influence  on  their  sense  organs,  and  through  these  on 
their  minds  by  the  production  there  of  conscious  states  such  as 
sensations ;  finally  that  external  phenomena  have  a  real  and 
positive  influence  on  one  another  ;  that  by  action  and  interaction 
they  really  produce  the  changes  that  are  constantly  taking  place 
in  the  universe :  that  the  sun  does  really  heat  and  light  the  earth, 
that  the  sowing  of  the  seed  in  springtime  has  really  a  positive  in- 
fluence on  the  existence  of  crops  in  the  harvest,  that  the  taking  of 
poison  has  undoubtedly  a  real  influence  on  the  death  which  results 
from  it.  And  if  any  man  of  ordinary  intelligence  and  plain 
common  sense  is  told  that  such  belief  is  an  illusion,  that  in  all 
such  cases  the  connexion  between  the  things,  facts  or  events  which 
he  designates  as  "  cause"  and  "effect,"  is  a  mere  connexion  of  in- 
variable time  sequence  between  antecedents  and  consequents, 
that  in  no  case  is  there  evidence  of  any  positive,  productive  influence 
of  the  one  fact  upon  the  other,  he  will  either  smile  incredulously 
and  decline  to  take  his  objector  seriously,  or  he  will  simply  ask 
the  latter  to  prove  the  universal  belief  to  be  an  illusion.  His  con- 
viction of  the  real  and  objective  validity  of  his  notion  of  efficient 
cause,  as  something  which  positively  influences  the  happening 
of  things,  is  so  profound  and  ineradicable  that  it  must  necessarily 
be  grounded  in,  and  confirmed  by,  his  constant  experience  of  the 
real  world  in  which  he  lives  and  moves.  Not  that  he  professes 
to  be  able  to  explain  the  nature  vi  this  efficient  influence  in  which 
he  believes.  Even  if  he  were  a  philosopher  he  might  not  be  able 
to  satisfy  himself  or  others  on  this  point.  But  being  a  plain  man 
of  ordinary  intelligence  he  has  sense  enough  to  distinguish  between 
the  existence  of  a  fact  and  its  nature,  its  explanation,  its  quomodo  ; 
and  to  believe  in  the  real  existence  of  a  positive  efficient,  productive 
influence  of  cause  on  effect,  however  this  influence  is  to  be  con- 
ceived or  explained. 

A  second  argument  for  the  objective  validity  of  the  concept 
of  efficient  cause  may  be  drawn  from  a  consideration  of  the 
Principle  of  Causality.  The  experience  on  which  the  plain  man 
grounds  his  belief  in  the  validity  of  his  notion  of  cause  is  not  mere 
uninterpreted  sense  experience  in  its  raw  and  brute  condition,  so 
to  speak ;  it  is  this  sense  experience  rationalized,  assimilated  into 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  385 

his  intelligence — spontaneously  and  half  unconsciously,  perhaps — 
by  the  light  of  the  self-evident  Principle  of  Causality,  that  what- 
ever happens  has  a  cause.  When  the  plain  man  believes  that  all 
the  various  agencies  in  nature,  like  those  enumerated  above,  are 
not  merely  temporal  antecedents  or  concomitants  of  their  effects, 
but  are  really  productive  of  those  effects,  he  is  really  applying  the 
universal  and  necessary  truth — that  an  "  event,"  a  "  happening,"  a 
"  change,"  a  "  commencement "  of  any  new  actual  mode  of  being 
demands  the  existence  of  another  actual  being  as  cause — the  truth 
embodied  in  the  Principle  of  Causality,  to  this,  that,  and  the  other 
event  of  his  experience :  he  is  locating  the  "  causes  "  of  these 
events  in  the  various  persons  and  things  which  he  regards  as  the 
agents  or  producers  of  these  events.  In  making  such  applications 
he  may  very  possibly  err  in  detail.  But  no  actual  application  of 
the  principle  at  all  is  really  required  for  establishing  the  objective 
validity  of  the  concept  of  cause.  There  are  philosophers  who — 
erroneously,  as  we  shall  see — deny  that  the  Principle  of  Causality 
finds  its  application  in  the  domain  of  created  things,  who  hold, 
in  other  words,  that  no  created  beings  can  be  efficient  causes 
(102),  and  who  nevertheless  recognize,  and  quite  rightly,  that 
the  concept  of  efficient  cause  is  an  objectively  valid  concept.  And 
they  do  so  because  they  see  that  since  events,  beginnings,  happen- 
ings, changes,  are  real,  there  must  be  really  and  objectively 
existent  an  efficient  cause  of  them — whatever  and  wherever 
such  efficient  cause  may  be  :  whether  it  be  one  or  manifold,  finite 
or  infinite,  etc. 

We  have  already  examined  Hume's  attempt  to  deny  the  ontological 
necessity  of  the  Principle  of  Causality  and  to  substitute  therefor  a  subjectively 
or  psychologically  necessary  "  feeling  of  expectation  "  grounded  on  habitual 
association  of  ideas.  Kant,  on  the  other  hand,  admits  the  self-evident, 
necessary  character  of  the  Principle  ;  but  holds  that,  since  this  necessity  is 
engendered  by  the  mind's  imposing  a  subjective  form  of  thought  on  the  data 
of  sense  consciousness,  the  principle  is  validly  applicable  only  to  connexions 
within  the  world  of  mental  appearances,  and  not  at  all  to  the  world  of  real 
being.  He  thus  transfers  the  discussion  to  the  domain  of  Epistemology, 
where  in  opposition  to  his  theory  of  knowledge  the  Principle  of  Causality  can 
be  shown  to  be  applicable  to  all  contingent  reality,  and  to  be  therefore 
legitimately  employed  in  Natural  Theology  for  the  purpose  of  establishing 
the  real  existence  of  an  Uncaused  First  Cause. 

10 1.  ORIGIN  OF  THE  CONCEPT  OF  EFFICIENT  CAUSE— We 
have  seen  that  universal  belief  in  the  real  existence  of  efficient 
causes  is  grounded  in  experience.  The  formation  of  the  concept, 


386  ONTOLOGY 

and  its  application  or  extension  to  the  world  within  and  around 
us,  are  gradual.1  Active  power,  force,  energy,  efficiency,  faculty, 
or  by  whatever  other  name  we  may  call  it,  is  of  course  experienced 
only  in  its  actual  exercise,  in  action,  motion,  production  of 
change.  Our  first  experience  of  its  exercise  is  found  in  our  con- 
sciousness of  our  own  personal  activities,  mental  and  bodily :  in 
our  thinking^  willing  or  choosing,  in  our  deliberate  control  of 
our  mental  processes,  and  in  the  deliberate  exercise  of  our 
sense  faculties  and  bodily  organs.  In  all  this  we  are  conscious 
of  exerting  power,  force,  energy :  we  apprehend  ourselves  as 
agents  or  efficient  causes  of  our  mental  processes  and  bodily 
movements.  We  apprehend  these  happenings  as  due  to  the 
exercise  of  our  own  power  to  produce  them.  Seeing  other  human 
beings  behave  like  ourselves,  we  infer  by  analogy  that  they  also 
possess  and  exercise  active  powers  like  our  own,  that  they,  too, 
are  efficient  causes.  Finally,  observing  that  effects  like  to  those 
produced  by  ourselves,  whether  in  ourselves  or  in  the  material 
world  around  us,  are  also  consequent  on  certain  other  changes 
in  external  nature,  whether  organic  or  inorganic,  we  infer  by 
analogy  that  these  corporeal  things  have  also  powers,  forces, 
energies,  whereby  they  produce  these  effects.  While  our  senses 
testify  only  to  time  and  space  connexions  between  physical 
happenings  in  external  nature,  our  intellect  apprehends  action 
and  interaction,  i.e.  causal  dependence  of  events  on  the  active 
influence  or  efficiency  of  physical  things  as  agents  or  causes.2 
Thus,  our  knowledge  of  the  existence  and  nature  of  the  forces, 
powers  and  energies  which  constitute  material  things  efficient 
causes  is  posterior  to,  and  derived  by  analogy  from,  our  know- 
ledge of  the  mental  and  bodily  powers  which  reveal  themselves 
to  us  in  our  conscious  vital  processes  as  constituting  our  own 
personal  efficient  causality. 

This  conception  of  efficient  causality  even  in  the  inanimate 
things  of  external  nature,  after  the  analogy  of  our  own  vital  powers 
as  revealed  in  our  conscious  activities,  is  sometimes  disparaged 
as  nai've  anthropomorphism.  It  just  depends  on  the  manner 

1  Cf.  MAHER,  Psychology,  ch.  xvii.,  pp.  368-70. — MERCIER,  op.  cit.  §  229. 

2  "  When  an  effort  of  attention  combines  two  ideas,  when  one  billiard  ball  moves 
another,  when  a  steam  hammer  flattens  out  a  lump  of  solid  iron,  when  a  blow  on 
the  head  knocks  a  man  down,  in  all  these  cases  there  is  something  more  than,  and 
essentially  different  from,  the  mere  sequence  of  two  phenomena :  there  is  effective 

force — causal  action  of  an  agent  endowed  with  real  energy" — MAKER,  op,  cit,,  ibid,, 
P-  370. 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  387 

and  degree  in  which  we  press  the  analogy.  Observing  that  our 
earlier  notion  of  cause  is  "the  notion  of  power  combined  with  a 
purpose  and  an  end  "  (thus  including  efficient  and  final  causality), 
Newman  remarks1  that  "Accordingly,  wherever  the  world  is 
young,  the  movements  and  changes  of  physical  nature  have  been 
and  are  spontaneously  ascribed  by  its  people  to  the  presence  and 
will  of  hidden  agents,  who  haunt  every  part  of  it,  the  woods,  the 
mountains  and  the  streams,  the  air  and  the  stars,  for  good  or  for 
evil — just  as  children  again,  by  beating  the  ground  after  falling, 
imply  that  what  has  bruised  them  has  intelligence".  This  is 
anthropomorphism.  So,  too,  would  be  the  conception  of  the 
forces  or  powers  of  inanimate  nature  as  powers  of  sub-conscious 
"perception"  and  " appetition"  (Leibniz),  or,  again,  as  rudimentary 
or  diminished  "will-power"  (Cousin).2  "Physical  phenomena, 
as  such,  are  without  sense,"  as  Newman  rightly  observes ;  and 
consequently  we  may  not  attribute  to  them  any  sort  of  conscious 
efficiency,  whether  perceptive  or  appetitive.  But  Newman 
appears  to  err  in  the  opposite  direction  when  he  adds  that  "  ex- 
perience teaches  us  nothing  about  physical  phenomena  as 
causes  ".3  The  truth  lies  between  these  extremes.  Taking 
experience  in  the  wide  sense  in  which  it  includes  rational  inter- 
pretation of,  and  inference  from,  the  data  of  internal  and  external 
sense  perception,  experience  certainly  reveals  to  us  the  existence 
of  physical  phenomena  as  efficient  causes,  or  in  other  words  that 
there  is  real  and  efficient  causality  not  only  in  our  own  persons 
but  also  in  the  external  physical  universe  ;  and  as  to  the  nature 
of  this  causality  it  also  gives  us  at  least  some  little  reliable  in- 
formation. 

By  pursuing  this  latter  question  a  little  we  shall  be  led  to 
examine  certain  difficulties  which  lie  at  the  root  of  Occasionalism  : 
the  error  of  denying  that  creatures,  or  at  least  merely  corporeal 

1  Grammar  of  Assent,  p.  66. 

2C/.  DOMET  DE  VORGES,  Cause  efficiente  et  cause  jtnale,  p.  39.  Volitional 
activity  is  no  doubt  the  most  prominent  type  of  efficient  causality  in  our  mental  life. 
But  it  is  not  the  only  type ;  we  have  direct  conscious  experience  of  intellectual 
effort,  of  the  work  of  the  imagination,  of  the  exercise  of  organic  and  muscular 
energy.  There  is  no  warrant  therefore  for  conceiving  all  efficient  power  or  energy, 
after  the  model  of  will-power,  as  Newman  among  others  appears  to  have  done 
when  he  wrote  in  these  terms :  "  Starting,  then,  from  experience,  I  consider  a  cause 
to  be  an  effective  will :  and  by  the  doctrine  of  causation,  I  mean  the  notion,  or  first 
principle,  that  all  things  come  of  effective  will"  (ibid.,  p.  68).  No  doubt,  all  things 
do  come  ultimately  from  the  effective  will  of  God.  This,  however,  is  not  a  first 
principle,  but  a  remote  philosophical  conclusion. 

*ibid.,  p.  66. 

25* 


388  ONTOLOGY 

creatures,  can  be  in  any  true  sense  efficient  causes.  A  detailed 
inquiry  into  the  nature  of  the  active  powers,  forces  or  energies  of 
the  inorganic  universe,  i.e.  into  the  nature  of  corporeal  efficient 
causality,  belongs  to  Cosmology ;  just  as  a  similar  inquiry  into 
vital y  sentient  and  spiritual  efficient  causality  belongs  to  Psycho- 
logy. Here  we  have  only  to  ascertain  what  is  common  and 
essential  to  all  efficient  causality  as  such,  what  in  general  is  in- 
volved in  the  exercise  of  efficient  causality,  in  actio  and  passio> 
and  what  are  the  main  implications  revealed  in  a  study  of  it. 
1 02.  ANALYSIS  OF  EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY,  OR  Actio  AND 

Passio :  (a)  THE  FIRST  CAUSE  AND  CREATED  CAUSES. — We 
have  already  referred  to  the  universal  dependence  of  all  created 
causes  on  the  First  Cause ;  and  we  shall  have  occasion  to  return 
to  it  in  connexion  with  Occasionalism.  God  has  created  all 
second  causes ;  He  has  given  them  their  powers  of  action ;  He 
conserves  their  being  and  their  powers  in  existence ;  He  applies 
these  powers  or  puts  them  in  act ;  He  concurs  with  all  their 
actions ;  He  is  therefore  the  principal  cause  of  all  their  effects ; 
and  in  relation  to  Him  they  are  as  instrumental  causes:  "Deus 
est  causa  actionis  cujuslibet  inquantum  dat  virtutem  agendi,  et 
inquantum  conservat  earn,  et  inquantum  applicat  actioni,  et 
inquantum  ejus  virtute  omnis  alia  virtus  agit."  J 

In  our  analysis  of  change  (10)  we  saw  why  no  finite,  created 
agent  can  be  the  adequate  cause  of  the  new  actualities  or  perfec- 
tions involved  in  change,  and  how  we  are  therefore  obliged,  by  a 
necessity  of  thought,  to  infer  the  existence  of  a  First  Cause,  an 
Unchanging,  Infinite  Source  of  these  new  actualities. 2 

The  principle  upon  which  the  argument  was  based  is  this : 
that  the  actuality  of  the  effect  is  something  over  and  above  the 
reality  which  it  had  in  the  passive  potentiality  of  its  created 
material  cause  and  in  the  active  powers  of  its  created  efficient 
cause  antecedently  to  its  production :  that  therefore  the  produc- 
tion of  this  actuality,  this  novum  essey  implies  the  influence — by 
way  of  co-operation  or  concursus  with  the  created  efficient  cause 
— of  an  Actual  Being  in  whom  the  actuality  of  all  effects  is 
contained  in  an  eminently  perfect  way.  Even  with  the  Divine 

1  ST.  THOMAS,  QQ.  Disp.  De  Potentia,  q.  iii.,  art.  7,  in  c. 

2  "  Nulla  res  per  seipsam  movet  vel  agit,  nisi  sit  movens  non  motum.  .  .  .  Et  quia 
natura  inferior  agens  non  agit  nisi  mota  .  .  .  et  hoc  non  cessat  quousque  perveniatur 
ad  Deum,  sequitur  de  necessitate  quod  Deus  sit  causa  actionis  cujuslibet  rei  naturalis, 
ut  movens  et  applicans  virtutem  ad  agendum." — ST.  THOMAS,  De  Potentia  De^ 
g.  iii.,  art.  7- 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  389 

concursus  a  created  cause  cannot  itself  create,  because  even  with 
this  concursus  its  efficiency  attains  only  to  the  modifying  or 
changing  of  pre-existing  being :  and  in  creation  there  is  no  pre- 
existing being,  no  material  cause,  no  real  passive  potentiality  to 
be  actuated.  But  without  this  concursus  not  only  can  it  not 
create ;  it  cannot  even,  as  an  efficient  cause,  actuate  a  real  pre- 
existing potentiality.  And  why  ?  Because  its  efficiency  cannot 
attain  to  the  production  of  new  actuality.  It  determines  the 
mode  of  this  actuality,  and  therein  precisely  lies  the  efficiency  of 
the  created  cause.  But  the  positive  entity  or  perfection  of  this  new 
actuality  can  be  produced  only  by  the  Infinite,  Changeless,  Inex- 
haustible Source  of  all  actuality,  co-operating  with  the  created 
cause  J  (103). 

But,  it  might  be  objected,  perhaps  created  efficient  causes 
are  themselves  the  adequate  and  absolutely  independent  principles 
of  the  whole  actuality  of  their  effects  ?  They  cannot  be  such ; 
and  that  for  the  simple  reason  that  they  are  not  always  in  act. 
Were  they  such  they  should  be  always  and  necessarily  in  act : 
they  should  always  and  necessarily  contain  in  themselves,  and 
that  actually  and  in  an  eminently  perfect  manner,  all  the  perfec- 
tions of  all  the  effects  which  they  gradually  produce  in  the  uni- 
verse. But  experience  shows  us  that  created  causes  are  not  al- 
ways acting,  that  their  active  power,  their  causality  in  actu  primo 
is  not  to  be  identified  with  their  action,  their  causality  in  actu 
secundo ;  and  reason  tells  us  that  since  this  is  so,  since  action  is 
something  more  than  active  power,  since  a  cause  acting  has  more 
actuality  than  the  same  cause  not  acting,  it  must  have  been 

1  This  is  the  principle  repeatedly  expressed  by  ST.  THOMAS  :  "  Unde  quarto 
modo  unum  est  causa  alterius,  sicut  principale  agens  est  causa  actionis  instrumenti : 
et  hoc  modo  etiam  oportet  dicere,  quod  Deus  est  causa  omnis  actionis  rei  naturalis. 
Quanto  enim  aliqua  causa  est  altior,  tanto  est  eommunior  et  efficacior,  tanto  pro- 
fundius  ingreditur  in  effectum,  et  de  remotiori  potentia  ipsum  reducit  in  actum.  In 
qualibet  autem  re  naturali  invenimus  quod  est  ens  et  quod  est  res  naturalis,  et  quod 
est  talis  vel  talis  naturae.  Quorum  primum  est  commune  omnibus  entibus ;  secundum 
omnibus  rebus  naturalibus ;  tertium  in  una  specie;  et  quartum,  si  addamus 
accidentia,  est  proprium  huic  individuo.  Hoc  ergo  individuum  agendo  non  potest 
constituere  aliud  in  simili  specie,  nisi  prout  est  instrumentum  illius  causae  quae 
respicit  totam  speciem  et  ulterius  totum  esse  naturae  inferioris.  Et  propter  hoc 
nihil  agit  in  speciem  in  istis  inferioribus  .  .  .  nee  aliquid  agit  ad  esse  nisi  per 
virtutem  Dei.  Ipsum  enim  esse  est  communissimus  effectus,  primus  et  intimior 
omnibus  aliis  effectibus ;  et  idea  soli  Deo  competit  secundum  virtutem  propriam  talis 
effectus :  unde  etiam,  ut  dicitur  in  Lib.  de  Causis  (prop.  9),  intelligentia  non  dat 
esse,  nisi  prout  est  in  ea  virtus  divina.  Sic  ergo  Deus  est  causa  omnis  actionis 
prout  quodlibet  agens  est  instrumentum  divinae  virtutis  operands." — ST.  THOMAS, 
De  Potentia  Dei,  q.  iii.  art.  7.— Cf.  supfa,  gg  (c),  p.  375,  n.  2. 


390  ONTOLOGY 

determined  or  reduced  to  action  by  some  actuality  other  than  it- 
self. This  surplus  of  actuality  or  perfection  in  an  acting  cause, 
as  compared  with  the  same  cause  prior  to  its  acting,  is  the  Divine 
concursus.  In  other  words,  an  active  power  which  is  really  distinct 
from  its  action  requires  to  be  moved  or  reduced  to  its  act  (which 
is  actio)  no  less  than  a  passive  potentiality  required  to  be  moved  to 
its  act  (which  is  passio\  by  some  really  distinct  actual  being.  A 
created  efficient  cause,  therefore,  by  passing  from  the  state  of  rest, 
or  mere  power  to  act,  into  the  state  of  action,  is  perfected  by 
having  its  active  power  actualized,  i.e.  by  the  Divine  concursus :  in 
this  sense  action  is  a  perfection  of  the  agent.  But  it  is  not  an  enti- 
tative  perfection  of  the  latter' s  essence ;  it  is  not  a  permanent  or 
stable  elevation  or  perfection  of  the  latter's  powers ;  it  is  not  the 
completion  of  any  passive  potentiality  of  the  latter ;  nor  there- 
fore is  it  properly  speaking  a  change  of  the  agent  as  such ;  it 
is,  as  we  have  said  already,  rather  an  index  of  the  latter's  per- 
fection in  the  scale  of  real  being.1  Action  really  perfects  the 
pattens ;  and  only  when  this  is  identical  in  its  concrete  indi- 
viduality with  the  agens  is  the  latter  permanently  perfected  by 
the  action. 

The  action  of  created  causes,  therefore,  depends  on  the 
action  of  the  First  Cause.  We  derive  our  notion  of  action 
from  the  former  and  apply  it  analogically  to  the  latter.  If  we 
compare  them  we  shall  find  that,  notwithstanding  many  differences, 
the  notion  of  action  in  general  involves  a  "  simple  "  or  "  unmixed  " 
perfection  which  can,  without  anthropomorphism,  be  applied 
analogically  to  the  Divine  Action.  The  Divine  Action  is  identical 
with  the  Divine  Power  and  the  Divine  Essence.  In  creatures 
essence,  power  and  action  are  really  distinct.  The  Divine  Action, 
when  creative,  has  not  for  its  term  a  change  in  the  strict  sense  ( I  o, 
1 1),  for  it  produces  being  ex  nihilo,  whereas  the  action  of  creatures 
cannot  have  for  term  the  production  of  new  being  ex  nihilo>  but 
only  the  change  of  pre-existing  being.  The  Divine  Action, 
whether  in  creating  or  conserving  or  concurring  with  creatures, 
implies  in  God  no  real  transition  from  power  to  act ;  whereas 
the  action  of  creatures  does  imply  such  transition  in  them.  Such 
are  the  differences ;  but  with  them  there  is  this  point  of  agree- 
ment :  the  Divine  Action  implies  in  God  > an  efficiency  which  has 

1  Why,  then,  is  a  finite  cause  not  capable  of  acting  uninterruptedly  ?  why  are  its 
powers,  forces,  energies,  fatigued,  lessened,  exhausted  by  exercise  ?  Simply  because 
its  action  is  proportionate  to  its  powers,  and  these  to  its  finite  nature. 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  391 

for  its  term  the  origin  of  new  being  dependency  on  this  efficiency} 
So,  too,  does  the  action  of  creatures.  Positive  efficient  influence  on 
the  one  side,  and  the  origin,  production,  or  "fieri ' '  of  new  actual 
being  on  the  other,  with  a  relation  of  real  dependence  on  this  efficiency  : 
such  is  the  essential  note  of  all  efficient  causality,  whether 
of  God  or  of  creatures.2 

103.  (&)  ACTIO  IMMANENS  AND  ACTIO  TRANSIENT— Let 
us  compare  in  the  next  place  the  perfectly  immanent  spiritual 
causality  of  thought,  the  less  perfectly  immanent  organic  causality 
of  living  things,  and  the  transitive  physical  causality  of  the 
agencies  of  inorganic  nature.  The  term  of  an  immanent  action 
remains  either  within  the  very  faculty  which  elicits  it,  affecting  this 
faculty  as  a  habit :  thus  acts  of  thought  terminate  in  the  intel- 
lectual habits  called  sciences,  acts  of  free  choice  in  the  habits  of 
will  called  virtues  or  vices?  Or  it  remains  at  least  within  the 
agent :  as  when  in  the  vital  process  of  nutrition  the  various  parts  and 
members  of  the  living  organism  so  interact  as  procure  the  growth 
and  development  of  the  living  individual  which  is  the  cause  of 
these  functions.4  In  those  cases  the  agent  itself  is  \hepatiens, 
whereas  every  agency  in  the  inorganic  universe  acts  not  upon  it- 
self, but  only  on  some  other  thing,  transitively.  But  immanent 
action,  no  less  than  transitive  action,  is  productive  of  real  change 

1  "  Creatio  non  est  mutatio  nisi  secundum  modum  intelligendi  tantum.  Nam  de 
ratione  mutationis  est  quod  aliquid  idem  se  habeat  aliter  nunc  et  prius.  .  .  .  Sed 
in  creatione,  per  quam  producitur  tota  substantia  rei,  non  potest  accipi  aliquid  idem 
aliter  se  habens  nunc  et  prius,  nisi  secundum  intellectum  tantum  ;  sicut  si  intelligatur 
aliqua  res  prius  non  fuisse  totaliter,  et  postea  esse.  Sed  cum  actio  et  passio 
conveniant  in  una  substantia  motus,  et  differant  solum  secundum  habitudines 
diveras  .  .  .  oportet  quod  subtract©  motu,  non  remaneant  nisi  diversae  habitudines 
in  creante  et  create.  Sed  quia  modus  significandi  sequitur  modum  intelligendi  .  .  . 
creatio  significatur  per  modum  mutationis ;  et  propter  hoc  dicitur  quod  creare  est 
ex  nihilo  aliquid  facere ;  quamvis  facere  et  fieri  magis  in  hoc  conveniant  quam 
mutare  et  mutari ;  quia  facere  et  fieri  important  habitudinem  causae  ad  effectum  et 
effectus  ad  causam,  sed  mutationem  ex  consequent!. " — ST.  THOMAS,  Summa  TheoL, 
i.,  q.  xlv.,  art.  2,  ad.  2. 

2 "Remote  motu,  actio  nihil  aliud  importat  quam  ordinem  originis  [effectus] 
secundum  quod  [effectus]  a  causa  aliqua  procedit." — op.  cit.,  i.  q.  xli.,  art.  i,  ad  2. 

3  The  act  of  the  will  is,  of  course,  virtually  transitive  when  it  wills  or  determines 
bodily  movements. — Cf.  MAKER,  Psychology,  chs.  x.,  xxiii.  (pp.  517-24). 

4  At  the  same  time  it  must  be  noted  that  organic  vital  activity  is  transitive  in  the 
sense  that  no  part  or  member  of  the  organism  acts  upon  itself,  but  only  on  other 
parts,  in  the  production  of  the  local,  quantitative  and  qualitative  changes  involved 
in  nutrition.     It  is  subject  to  the  inductively  established  law  which  seems  to  regulate 
all  corporeal  action :  that  all  such  action  involves  reaction  of  the  patiens  on  the 
agens.     Mental  activity  is  outside  this  law.     Cognitive  and  appetitive  faculties  do  not 
react  on  the  objects  which  reduce  these  faculties  to  act,  thus  arousing  their  imma- 
nent activity. — Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  tit.,  §  227. 


392  ONTOLOGY 

— not,  of  course,  in  the  physical  sense  in  which  this  term  is 
identified  with  "  motion  "  and  understood  of  corporeal  change, 
but  in  the  metaphysical  sense  of  an  actuation  of  some  passive 
potentiality  (10,  n).1 

What,  then,  do  we  find  common  to  the  immanent  and 
the  transitive  causality  of  created  causes?  An  active  power  or 
influence  on  the  side  of  the  agent,  an  actuation  of  this  active  power, 
either  by  the  action  of  other  causes  on  this  agent,  or  by  the 
fulfilment  of  all  conditions  requisite  for  the  action  of  the  agent, 
and  in  all  cases  by  the  concursus  of  the  First  Cause ;  and,  on 
the  side  of  the  effect,  the  production  of  some  new  actuality,  the 
actuation  of  some  passive  potentiality,  dependently  on  the  cause 
now  in  action. 

Thus  we  see  that  in  all  cases  action,  or  the  exercise  of  efficient 
causality,  implies  that  something  which  was  not  actual  becomes 
actual,  that  something  which  was  not,  now  is  ;  and  that  this  becoming, 
this  actuation,  ^s\vs>  production,  is  really  and  essentially  dependent 
on  the  influence,  the  efficiency,  of  some  actual  being  or  beings, 
which  we  therefore  call  efficient  causes. 

104.  ERRONEOUS  THEORIES  OF  EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY.  IMAGINATION 
AND  THOUGHT. — Are  we  certain  of  anything  more  about  the  nature  of  this  con- 
necting link  between  efficient  cause  and  effect,  which  we  call  action  ?  Specula- 
tions and  theories  there  are  indeed  in  abundance.  Some  of  these  can  be  shown 
to  be  false  ;  and  thus  our  knowledge  of  the  real  nature  of  action  may  be  at  least 
negatively  if  not  positively  perfected.  Our  concept  of  action  is  derived,  like 
all  our  concepts,  from  experience  ;  and  although  we  are  conscious  of  spiritual 
action  in  the  exercise  of  intellect  and  will,  yet  it  is  inseparably  allied  with 
sentient  action  and  this  again  with  organic  and  corporeal  action.  Nor  can 
we  conceive  or  describe  spiritual  action  without  the  aid  of  imagination  images, 
or  in  language  other  than  that  borrowed  from  the  domain  of  corporeal  things, 
which  are  the  proper  object  of  the  human  intellect.2  Now  in  all  this  there  is 
a  danger  :  the  danger  of  mistaking  imagination  images  for  thoughts,  and  of 
giving  a  literal  sense  to  language  in  contexts  where  this  language  must  be 
rightly  understood  to  apply  only  analogically. 

In  analysing  the  nature  of  efficient  causality  we  might  be  tempted  to 
think  that  we  understood  it  by  imagining  some  sort  of  ^flow  or  transference 
of  some  sort  of  actual  reality  from  agens  to  patiens.  It  is  quite  true 
that  in  describing  action,  the  actual  connecting  link  between  agens  and 
patiens,  we  have  to  use  language  suggestive  of  some  such  imagination  image. 
We  have  no  option  in  the  matter,  for  all  human  language  is  based  upon  sense 
consciousness  of  physical  phenomena.  When  we  describe  efficiency  as  an 
"  influence  "  of  cause  on  effect,  or  the  effect  as  "  dependent  "  on  the  cause, 
the  former  term  suggests  a  "  flowing,"  just  as  the  latter  suggests  a  "  hanging  ". 
So,  too,  when  we  speak  of  the  effect  as"  arising,"  "originating,"  "springing," 

1  Cf.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.  2  Cf.  MAKER,  Psychology,  chs.  xiii.  and  xiv. 


EFFICIENT  CA  USALIT  Y  393 

or  "  emanating,"  from  the  cause.1  But  we  have  got  to  ask  ourselves  what  such 
language  means,  i.e.,  what  concepts  it  expresses,  and  not  what  imagination 
images  accompany  the  use  of  it. 

Now  when  we  reflect  that  the  senses  testify  only  to  time  and  space  se- 
quences and  collocations  of  the  phenomena  which  we  regard  as  causally 
connected,  and  when  we  feel  convinced  that  there  is  something  more  than 
this  in  the  causal  connexion,—  which  something  more  we  describe  in  the  terms 
illustrated  above, — we  must  inquire  whether  we  have  any  rational  ground  for 
thinking  that  this  something  more  is  really  anything  in  the  nature  of  a  spatial 
transference  of  some  actual  reality  from  agens  to  patiens.  There  are  indeed 
many  philosophers  and  scientists  who  seem  to  believe  that  there  is  such  a 
local  transference  of  some  actuality  from  cause  to  effect,  that  efficient  causality 
is  explained  by  it,  and  cannot  be  intelligibly  explained  otherwise.  As  a 
matter  of  fact  there  is  no  rational  ground  for  believing  in  any  such  transference, 
and  even  were  there  such  transference,  so  far  from  its  being  the  only  intelli- 
gible explanation  of  efficient  causality,  it  would  leave  the  whole  problem  entirely 
unexplained — and  not  merely  the  problem  of  spiritual,  immanent  causality,  to 
which  it  is  manifestly  inapplicable,  but  even  the  problem  of  corporeal,  transitive 
causality.2 

We  have  already  referred  at  some  length  (9-11)  to  the  philosophy  which 
has  endeavoured  to  reduce  all  change,  or  at  least  all  corporeal  change,  to 
mechanical  change ;  all  qualities,  powers,  forces,  energies  of  the  universe,  to 
ultimate  particles  or  atoms  of  matter  in  motion  ;  and  all  efficient  causality  to 
a  flow  or  transference  of  spatial  motion  from  particle  to  particle  or  from  body 
to  body.  A  full  analysis  of  all  such  theories  belongs  to  Cosmology.  But 
we  may  recall  a  few  of  the  more  obvious  considerations  already  urged  against 
them. 

In  the  first  place,  the  attempt  to  explain  all  qualities  in  the  material  uni- 
verse— all  the  powers,  forces,  energies,  of  matter — by  maintaining  that  objec- 
tively and  extramentally  they  are  all  purely  quantitative  realities,  all  spatial  mo- 
tions of  matter — does  not  explain  the  qualitative  factors  and  distinctions  in  the 
world  of  our  sense  experience  at  all,  but  simply  transfers  the  problem  of  ex- 
plaining them  from  the  philosophy  of  matter  to  the  philosophy  of  mind,  by 
making  them  all  subjective  after  the  manner  of  Kant's  analysis  of  experience 
(11). 

In  the  second  place,  when  we  endeavour  to  conceive,  to  apprehend  intel- 
lectually, how  motion,  or  indeed  any  other  physical  or  real  entity,  could  actu- 
ally pass  or  be  transferred  from  agens  \apatiens,  whether  these  be  spati- 
ally in  contact  or  not,  we  find  such  a  supposition  positively  unintelligible. 

1  Cf.  URRABURU  :  "  Vel,  si  mavis,  die  causam  efficientem  esse  causam,  a  qua  fit 
aliquid,  vel  a  quo  proprie  oritur  actio,  intelligendo  per  actionem  emanationem  et 
fluxum  ac  dependentiam  effectus  a  causa." — op.  cit.,  §  389  (p.  1112). 

2C/.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  229 :  "  L'action,  1'efficience,  qu'est  elle,^en  quoi  consiste- 
t-elle  ?  Est-ce  une  sorte  d'e"coulement  de  la  cause  dans  1'effet  ?  Evidemment  non. 
Lorsque  nous  voulons  nous  clever  &  une  conception  m^taphysique,  nous  nous  raccro- 
chons  &  une  image  sensible,  et  nous  nous  persuadons  volontiers,  que  la  nettet£  de  la 
premiere  repond  b.  la  facilite"  avec  laquelle  nous  nous  figurons  la  seconde.  II  faut  se 
defier  de  cette  illusion.  Puisque  1'action,  meme  corporelle,  ne  modifie  point  1'agent, 
la  causalite"  efficiente  ne  peut  consister  dans  un  influx  physique,  qui  passerait  de  la 
cause  dans  reflet." 


394  ONTOLOGY 

Motion  is  not  a  substance  ;  and  if  it  is  an  accident  it  cannot  migrate  from  sub- 
ject to  subject.  The  idea  that  corporeal  efficient  causality — even  mechanical 
causality — can  be  explained  by  such  a  transference  of  actual  accidental  modes 
of  being  from  agens  topatiens  is  based  on  a  very  crude  and  erroneous  conception 
of  what  an  accidental  mode  of  being  really  is  (65). 

The  more  we  reflect  on  the  nature  of  real  change  in  the  universe,  and  of 
the  efficient  causality  whereby  it  is  realized,  the  more  convinced  we  must 
become  that  there  can  be  no  satisfactory  explanation  of  these  facts  which  does 
not  recognize  and  take  account  of  this  great  fundamental  fact :  that  contingent 
real  being  is  not  all  actual,  that  it  is  partly  potential  and  partly  actual ;  that 
therefore  our  concepts  of  "  passive  potentiality  "  and  "  active  power  "  are  not 
mere  subjective  mental  motions,  with  at  best  a  mere  regulative  or  systematiz- 
ing function  (after  the  manner  of  Kant's  philosophy),  but  that  they  are  really 
and  objectively  valid  concepts — concepts  which  from  the  time  of  Aristotle  have 
given  philosophers  the  only  insight  into  the  nature  of  efficient  causality  which  is 
at  any  rate  satisfactory  and  intelligible  as  far  as  it  goes. 

Of  this  great  fact  the  advocates  of  the  mechanical  theory  of  efficient 
causality  have,  in  the  third  place,  failed  to  take  account.  And  it  is  partly  be- 
cause with  the  revival  of  atomism  at  the  dawn  of  modern  philosophy  this 
traditional  Aristotelian  conception  of  contingent  being  as  potential  and  actual 
was  lost  sight  of  (64),  that  such  a  crude  and  really  unintelligible  account  of 
efficient  causality,  as  a  "flow  of  motion,"  has  been  able  to  find  such  continued 
and  widespread  acceptance. 

Another  reason  of  the  prevalence  of  this  tendency  to  "  explain  "  all  phy- 
sical efficient  causality  as  a  propagation  of  spatial  motions  of  matter  is  to  be 
found  in  the  sensist  view  of  the  human  mind  which  confounds  intellectual 
thought  with  mental  imagery,  which  countenances  only  picturable  factors  in 
its  "explanations,"  and  denounces  as  "metaphysical,"  "occult,"  and  "  un- 
verifiable  "  all  explanatory  principles  such  as  forces,  powers,  potentialities,  etc., 
which  are  not  directly  picturable  in  the  imagination.1  And  it  is  a  curious  fact 
that  it  is  such  philosophers  themselves  who  are  really  guilty  of  the  charge  which 
they  lay  at  the  door  of  the  traditional  metaphysics  :  the  charge  of  offering  ex- 
planations— of  efficient  causality,  for  instance — which  are  really  no  explana- 
tions. For  while  they  put  forward  their  theory  of  the  "  flow  of  motion  "  as  a 
real  explanation  of  the  quomodo  of  efficient  causality — and  the  ultimate  and 
only  explanation  of  it  within  reach  of  the  human  mind,  if  we  are  to  accept  their 
view  of  the  matter — the  exponent  of  the  traditional  metaphysics  more  modestly 
confines  himself  to  setting  forth  the  inevitable  implications  of  the  fact  of 
efficient  causality,  and,  without  purporting  to  offer  any  positive  explanation  of 
the  real  nature  of  action  or  efficient  influence,  he  is  content  to  supplement  his 
analysis  negatively  by  pointing  out  the  unintelligible  and  illusory  character  of 
their  proffered  "  explanations  ". 

In  the  exact  methods  of  the  physical  sciences,  their  quantitative  evalua- 
tion of  all  corporeal  forces  whether  mechanical,  physical,  or  chemical,  in  terms 
of  mechanical  work,  which  is  measured  by  the  motion  of  matter  through 
space,  and  in  the  great  physical  generalization  known  as  the  law  of  the 
equivalence  of  energies,  or  of  the  equality  of  action  and  reaction, — we  can 
detect  yet  further  apparent  reasons  for  the  conception  of  efficient  causality  as 

1  C/.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §§  228-9. 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  395 

a  mere  transference  or  interchange  of  actual  physical  and  measurable  entities 
among  bodies.  It  is  an  established  fact  not  only  that  all  corporeal  agents 
gradually  lose  their  energy  or  power  of  action  by  actually  exercising  this 
power,  but  that  this  loss  of  energy  is  in  direct  proportion  to  the  amount  of  energy 
gained  by  the  recipients  of  their  action  ;  and  this  fact  would  naturally  suggest 
the  mental  picture  of  a  transference  of  some  actual  measurable  entity  from 
cause  to  effect.  But  it  does  not  necessarily  imply  such  transference — even  if 
the  latter  were  intelligible,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  it  is  not.  The  fact  is 
quite  intelligibly  explained  by  the  natural  supposition  that  in  proportion  as 
the  agens  exhausts  its  active  power  by  exercise  the  pattens  gains  in  some 
form  of  actuality.  Similarly,  the  fact  that  all  forms  of  corporeal  energy  can 
be  measured  in  terms  of  mechanical  energy  does  not  at  all  imply  that  they  all 
really  are  mechanical  energy,  but  only  that  natural  agents  can  by  the  use  of 
one  form  of  energy  produce  another  form  in  equivalent  quantity.  And  finally, 
the  law  of  the  conservation  of  corporeal  energy  in  the  universe  is  explained 
by  the  law  of  the  equality  of  action  and  reaction,  and  without  recourse  to 
the  unintelligible  supposition  that  this  sum-total  of  energy  is  one  unchanging 
and  unchangeable  actuality. 

There  is  just  one  other  consideration  which  at  first  sight  appears  to  favour 
the  "  transference  "  theory  of  causality,  but  which  on  analysis  shows  how  illusory 
the  proffered  explanation  is,  and  how  unintelligible  the  simplest  phenomenon 
of  change  must  be  to  those  who  fail  to  grasp  the  profound  significance  of  the 
principle  that  all  real  being  which  is  subject  to  change  must  of  necessity  be 
partly  potential  and  partly  actual.  We  allude  to  the  general  assumption  of 
physical  scientists  that  corporeal  action  of  whatsoever  kind  takes  place  only 
on  contact^  whether  mediate  or  immediate,  between  the  bodies  in  question.1 
Now  it  is  well  to  bear  in  mind  that  this  is  not  a  self-evident  truth  or  principle, 
but  only  an  hypothesis,  a  very  legitimate  hypothesis  and  one  which  works 
admirably,  but  still  only  an  hypothesis.  It  implies  the  assumption  that  some 
sort  of  substance — called  the  universal  ether — actually  exists  and  fills  all  space, 
serving  as  a  medium  for  the  action  of  gravitation,  light,  radiant  heat, 
electricity  and  magnetism,  between  the  earth  and  the  other  planets,  the  sun 
and  the  stars.  This  whole  supposition  is  the  only  thinkable  alternative  to 
actio  in  distans.  If  those  bodies  really  act  on  one  another — and  the  fact  that 
they  do  is  undeniable, — and  if  there  were  no  such  medium  between  them,  then 
the  causal  influence  of  one  body  should  be  able  to  produce  an  effect  in  another 
body  spatially  distant  from,  and  not  physically  connected  by  any  material 
medium  with,  the  former.  Hence  two  questions  :  Is  this  alternative,  actio  in 
distanS)  imaginable  ?  i.e.  can  we  form  any  positive  imagination  image  of 
how  this  would  take  place?  And  secondly:  Is  it  thinkable^  conceivable, 
intrinsically  possible  ?  We  need  not  hesitate  to  answer  the  former  question 
in  the  negative.  But  as  to  the  latter  question  all  we  can  say  is  that  we  have 
never  met  any  cogent  proof  of  the  intrinsic  impossibility  of  actio  in  distans. 
The  efficient  action  of  a  finite  cause  implies  that  it  has  active  power  and  is 

1  We  might  add  this  other  fact  :  that  all  kinds  of  corporeal  activity  and  change 
(n)  seem  to  involve  motion  or  local  change.  This  does  not  prove  that  they  all  are 
motion  or  local  change.  The  significance  of  the  fact  lies  probably  in  this,  that  local 
motion  is  necessary  for  procuring  and  continuing  physical  contact  between  the 
interacting  physical  agencies. — Cf.  NYS,  Cosmologie,  §§  227-9. 


396  ONTOLOGY 

conserved  in  existence  with  this  power  by  the  Creator  or  First  Cause,  that 
this  power  is  reduced  to  act  by  the  Divine  concursus,  and  that  dependency 
on  this  cause  so  acting  some  change  takes  place,  some  potentiality  is  actualized 
in  some  other  finite  being.  Nothing  more  than  this  is  involved  in  the  general 
concept  of  efficient  causality.  Of  course  real  influence  on  the  one  side,  and 
real  dependence  on  the  other,  imply  some  real  connexion  of  cause  with  effect. 
But  is  spatial  connexion  a  necessary  condition  of  real  connexion  ?  Is  a 
physical,  phenomenal,  imaginable,  efflux  of  some  entity  out  of  the  cause  into 
the  effect,  either  immediately  or  through  some  medium  as  a  channel,  a 
necessary  condition  for  real  influence?  There  is  nothing  of  the  kind  in 
spiritual  causality  ;  and  to  demand  anything  of  the  kind  for  causality  in 
general  would  be  to  make  imagination,  not  thought,  the  test  and  measure 
of  the  real.  But  perhaps  spatial  connexion  is  essential  to  the  real  connexion 
involved  in  this  particular  kind  of  causality,  corporeal  causality  ?  Perhaps. 
But  it  has  never  been  proved.  Too  little  is  known  about  the  reality  of  space, 
about  the  ultimate  nature  of  material  phenomena  and  their  relation  to  our 
minds,  to  justify  anything  like  dogmatism  on  such  an  ultimate  question.  It 
may  well  be  that  if  we  had  a  deeper  insight  into  these  things  we  could  pro- 
nounce actio  in  distans  to  be  absolutely  incompatible  with  the  essences  of 
the  things  which  do  as  a  matter  of  fact  constitute  the  actual  corporeal  universe. 
But  in  the  absence  of  such  insight  we  cannot  pronounce  actio  in  distans  to 
be  intrinsically  impossible.  Physical  scientists  assume  that  as  a  matter  of 
fact  bodies  do  not  act  in  distans.  Granted  the  assumption  to  be  correct,  it 
still  remains  an  open  question  whether  by  a  miracle  they  could  act  in  distans, 
i.e.  whether  or  not  such  action  would  be  incompatible  with  their  nature  as 
finite  corporeal  causes. 

Owing  to  a  very  natural  tendency  to  rest  in  imagination  images  we  are 
inclined  not  only  to  pronounce  as  impossible  any  process  the  mode  of  which 
is  not  positively  imaginable,  but  also  to  think  that  we  rightly  understand  a 
process  once  we  have  provided  ourselves  with  an  imagination  image  of  it — 
when  as  a  matter  of  fact  this  image  may  cover  an  entirely  groundless  concep- 
tion or  theory  of  the  process.  Hence  the  fairly  prevalent  idea  that  while  actio 
in  distans  is  impossible,  the  interaction  of  bodies  on  contact  is  perfectly  in- 
telligible and  presents  no  difficulties.  When  a  billiard  ball  in  motion  strikes 
another  at  rest  it  communicates  some  or  all  of  its  motion  to  the  other,  and 
that  is  all :  nothing  simpler  !  And  then  all  the  physical,  chemical,  and  sub- 
stantial changes  in  the  material  universe  are  reducible  to  this  common 
denominator!  The  atomic  philosophy,  with  its  two  modest  postulates  of 
matter  and  motion,  is  a  delightfully  simple  philosophy  ;  but  unfortunately  for  its 
philosophical  prestige  it  does  not  explain  causality  or  change.  Nor  can  these 
facts  be  explained  by  any  philosophy  which  ignores  the  most  elementary  im- 
plication of  all  real  change  :  the  implication  that  changing  reality  involves 
real  passive  potentialities  and  real  active  powers  or  forces  in  the  phenomena 
which  constitute  the  changing  reality  of  the  universe. 

105.  THE  SUBJECT  OF  EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY.  OCCA- 
SIONALISM.—We  have  established  the  objective  validity  of  the 
concept  of  efficient  causality  and  analysed  its  implications.  There 
have  been  philosophers  who,  while  admitting  the  objective  validity 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  397 

of  the  concept,  have  maintained  that  no  creature,  or  at  least  no 
corporeal  creature,  can  be  an  efficient  cause.  Efficient  influence 
is,  in  their  view,  incompatible  with  the  nature  of  a  corporeal 
substance :  only  spiritual  substances  can  be  efficient  causes : 
corporeal  things,  conditions,  and  happenings,  are  all  only  the 
occasions  on  which  spiritual  substances  act  efficiently  in  and 
through  all  created  nature.  Hence  the  name  of  the  theory  : 
Occasionalism.  There  are  two  forms  of  it :  the  milder,  which 
admits  that  created  spirits  or  minds  are  efficient  causes ;  and  the 
more  extreme  view,  according  to  which  no  creature  can  be  an 
efficient  cause,  inasmuch  as  efficient  causality  is  essentially  a 
Divine  attribute,  a  prerogative  of  the  Divinity. 

This  error  was  not  unknown  in  the  Middle  Ages, 1  but  it  was 
in  the  seventeenth  century  that  certain  disciples  of  Descartes, — 
Geulincx  (1625-1669)  and  Malebranche  (1638-1715), — expressly 
inferred  it  from  the  Cartesian  antithesis  of  matter  and  spirit 
and  the  Cartesian  doctrine  that  matter  is  essentially  inert,  or 
inactive.  According  to  the  gratuitous  and  unproven  assertion 
laid  down  by  Geulincx  as  a  principle  :  Quod  nescis  quomodo  fiat> 
id  nonfacis, — we  do  not  cause  our  own  sensations  or  reasoning 
processes,  nor  our  own  bodily  movements,  inasmuch  as  we  do  not 
know  how  these  take  place  ;  nor  can  bodies  cause  them,  any  more 
than  our  own  created  spirits,  inasmuch  as  bodies  are  essentially 
inactive.  According  to  Malebranche  the  mind  can  perceive  no 
necessary  nexus  between  effects  and  any  cause  other  than  the 
Divine  Will ; 2  moreover  reflection  convinces  us  that  efficient 
causality  is  something  essentially  Divine  and  incommunicable  to 
creatures  ; 3  and  finally  neither  bodies  can  be  causes,  for  they  are 
essentially  inert,  nor  our  minds  and  wills,  for  we  do  not  know 
how  a  volition  could  move  any  organ  or  member  of  our  bodies.4 
Yet  Malebranche,  at  the  cost  of  inconsistency  with  his  own 

1  C/.  ST.  THOMAS,  Contra  Gentes,  iii.,  69. 

2 "  Une  cause  veritable  est  une  cause,  entre  laquelle  et  son  effet  1'esprit 
aper£oit  une  liaison  ne"cessaire  :  c'est  ainsi  que  je  1'entendes.  [This  is  ambiguous.] 
Or  il  n'y  a  que  P£tre  infiniment  parfait  entre  la  volontS  duquel  et  les  effets  1'esprit 
apercoive  une  liaison  necessaire.  II  n'y  a  done  que  Dieu  qui  soit  veritable  cause, 
et  il  semble  meme  qu'il  y  ait  contradiction  a  dire  que  les  hommes  puissent  1'etre  " — 
De  la  recherche  de  la  verite,  Liv.  6m«,  2e  partie,  ch.  iii. 

3 "Si  1'onvient  a  considerer  attentivement  l'ide"e  que  1'on  a  de  cause  ou  de 
puissance  d'agir,  on  ne  peut  en  douter  que  cette  ide"e  ne  pre"sente  quelque  chose  de 
divin." — ibid. 

4"  II  n'y  a  point  d'homme  qui  sache  seulement  ce  qu'il  faut  faire  pour  remuer 
an  dq  ses  doigts  par  \e  moyen  des  esprits  anirnaux," — ibid. 


398  ONTOLOGY 

principles,  safeguards  free  will  in  man  by  allowing  an  exclusively 
immanent  efficiency  to  spiritual  causes.1 

Such  is  the  teaching  of  Occasionalism.  Our  criticism  of  it 
will  be  brief.2 

(i)  Against  the  doctrine  that  creatures  generally  are  not,  and 
cannot  be,  efficient  causes,  we  direct  the  first  argument  already 
outlined  (100)  against  Phenomenism  and  Positivism, — the  argu- 
ment from  the  universal  belief  of  mankind,  based  on  the  testi- 
mony of  consciousness  as  rationally  interpreted  by  human 
intelligence.  Consciousness  testifies  not  merely  that  processes  of 
thought,  imagination,  sensation,  volition,  etc.,  take  place  within 
our  minds  ;  not  merely  that  our  bodily  movements,  such  as 
speaking,  walking,  writing,  occur ;  but  that  we  are  the  causes  of 
them?  It  is  idle  to  say  that  we  do  not  efficiently  move  our 
limbs  because  we  may  not  be  able  to  understand  or  explain 
fully  "kow  an  unextended  volition  can  move  a  material  limb  ".  * 
Consciousness  testifies  to  the  fact  that  the  volition  does  move 
the  limb ;  and  that  is  enough.5  The  fact  is  one  thing,  the 
quomodo  of  the  fact  is  quite  another  thing.  Nor  is  there  any 
ground  whatever  for  the  assertion  that  a  cause,  in  order  to  pro- 
duce an  effect,  must  understand  how  the  exercise  of  its  own 
efficiency  brings  that  effect  about.  Moreover,  Malebranche's 
concession  of  at  least  immanent  activity  to  the  will  is  at  all  events 
an  admission  that  there  is  in  the  nature  of  the  creature  as  such 
nothing  incompatible  with  its  being  an  efficient  cause. 

1 "  J'ai  toujours  soutenue  que  1'ame  £tait  1'unique  cause  de  ses  actes,  c'est  & 
dire  de  ses  determinations  libres  ou  de  ses  actes  bons  ou  mauvais.  .  .  .  J'ai  toujours 
soutenu  que  1'ame  etait  active,  mais  que  ses  actes  ne  produisaient  rien  de  physique." 
— Reflexions  sur  la  promotion  physique.  "  Je  crois  que  la  volonte  est  une  puissance 
active,  qu'elle  a  un  veritable  pouvoir  de  se  determiner ;  mais  son  action  est 
immanente ;  c'est  une  action  qui  ne  produit  rien  par  son  efficace  propre,  pas  meme 
le  mouvement  de  son  bras." — Reponse  a  la  3me  lettre  cTArnauld. 

2C/.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §§  230-2 ;  ZIGLIARA,  Ontologia  (45) ;  URRABURU,  op.  cit., 
§§  393  sqq. 

3  We  may  reasonably  ask  the  occasionalist  to  suppose  for  the  moment  that  we 
are  efficient  causes  of  our  mental  processes  and  to  tell  us  what  better  proof  of  it 
could  he  demand,  or  what  better  proof  could  be  forthcoming,  than  this  proof  from 
consciousness. 

4  MAKER,  Psychology,  ch.  x.,  p.  220. 

5  Should  anyone  doubt  that  consciousness  does  testify  to   this  fact,  we  may 
prove  it  inductively  from  the  constant  correlation  between  the  mental  state  and  the 
bodily  movement :  "  I  will  to  move  my  arm,  it  moves;  I  will  that  it  remain  at  rest, 
it  does  not  move ;  I  will  that  its  movement  be  more  or  less  strong  and  rapid,  the 
strength  and  rapidity  vary  with  the  determination  of  my  will.     What  more  complete 
inductive  proof  can  we  have  of  the  efficiency  of  our  will- action  on  the  external  world 
—MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §  231. 


EFFICIENT  CA  USALIT  Y  399 

(2)  Although  Malebranche  bases  his  philosophy  mainly  on 
deductive,  a  priori  reasonings  from  a  consideration  of  the  Divine 
attributes,  his  system  is  really  derogatory  to  the  perfection  of  the 
First  Cause,  and  especially  to  the  Divine  Wisdom.     To  say,  for 
instance,  that  God  created  an  organ  so  well  adapted  to  discharge 
the  function  of  seeing  as  the  human  eye,  and  then  to  deny  that  the 
latter  discharges  this  or  any  function,  is  tantamount  to  accusing 
God  of  folly.     There  is  no  reason  in  this  system  why  any  created 
thing   or   condition  of  things  would   be  even   the    appropriate 
occasion  of  the  First  Cause  producing  any  definite  effect.     Every- 
thing would  be  an  equally  appropriate  occasion,  or  rather  nothing 
would  be  in  any  intelligible  sense  an  appropriate  occasion,  for 
any  exercise  of  the  Divine  causality.     The  admirable  order  of 
the  universe — with  its  unity  in  variety,  its  adaptation  of  means  to 
ends,    its   gradation    of  created    perfections — is    an    intelligible 
manifestation  of  the  Divine  perfections  on  the  assumption  that 
creatures  efficiently  co-operate  with  the  First  Cause  in  realizing 
and  maintaining  this  order.     But  if  they  were  all  inert,  inopera- 
tive, useless  for  this  purpose,  what  could  be  the  raison  d'etre  of 
their  diversified  endowments  and  perfections  ?     So  far  from  mani- 
festing the  wisdom,  power  and  goodness  of  God  they  would 
evidence  an  aimless  and  senseless  prodigality. 

(3)  Occasionalism  imperils  the  distinction  between  creatures 
and  a  personal  God.     Although  Malebranche,  fervent  catholic 
that  he  was,  protested  against  the  pantheism  of  "  le  miserable 
Spinoza,"  his  own  system  contains  the  undeveloped  germ  of  this 
pernicious  error.     For,  if  creatures  are  not  efficient  causes  not 
only  are  their  variety  and  multiplicity  meaningless,  as  contributing 
nothing  towards  the  order  of  the  universe,  but  their  very  existence 
as  distinct  realities  seems  to  have  no  raison  d'etre.     Malebranche 
emphasizes  the  truth  that  God  does  nothing  useless  ;  Dieu  ne  fait 
rien  d?  inutile.     Very  well.     If,  then,  a  being  does  nothing •,  what 
purpose  is  served  by  its  existence?     Of  what  use  is  it?     What 
is  the  measure  of  a  creature's  reality,  if  not  its  action  and  its 
power  of  action  ?     So  intimately  in  fact  is  this  notion  of  causality 
bound  up  with  the  notion  of  the  very  reality  of  things  that  the 
concept  of  an  absolutely  inert,  inactive  reality  is  scarcely  intelli- 
gible.    It  is  almost  an  axiom  in  scholastic  philosophy  that  every 
nature  has  its    correlative  activity,  every  being    its    operation  : 
Omne  ens  est  propter  suam  operationem  ;  Omnis  natura  ordinatur 
ad  propriam  operationem.     Hence  if  what  we  call  creatures  had 


400  ONTOLOGY 

really  no  proper  activity  distinct  from  that  of  the  First  Cause,  on 
what  grounds  could  we  suppose  them  to  have  a  real  and  proper 
existence  of  their  own  distinct  from  the  reality  of  the  Infinite 
Being?  Or  who  could  question  the  lawfulness  of  the  inference 
that  they  are  not  really  creatures,  but  only  so  many  phases,  aspects, 
manifestations  of  the  one  and  sole  existing  reality  ?  Which  is 
Pantheism. 

(4)  Occasionalism  leads  to  Subjective  Idealism  by  destroying 
all  ground  for  the  objective  validity  of  human  science.  How 
do  we  know  the  real  natures  of  things  ?  By  reasoning  from  their 
activities  in  virtue  of  the  principle,  Operari  sequitur  esse.1  But  if 
things  have  no  activities,  no  operations,  such  reasoning  is  illusory. 
How,  for  instance,  do  we  justify  by  rational  demonstration, 
in  opposition  to  subjectivism,  the  common-sense  interpretation 
of  the  data  of  sense  consciousness  as  revealing  to  us  the  real  and 
extramental  existence  of  a  material  universe?  By  arguing,  in 
virtue  of  the  principle  of  causality,  from  our  consciousness  of  our 
own  passivity  in  external  sense  perception,  to  the  real  existence 
of  bodies  outside  our  minds,  as  excitants  of  our  cognitive  activity 
and  partial  causes  of  these  conscious,  perceptive  processes.  But 
if  occasionalism  were  true  such  inference  would  be  illusory,  and 
we  should  infer,  with  Berkeley,  that  only  God  and  minds  exist, 
but  not  any  material  universe.  Malebranche  admits  the  possible 
validity  of  this  inference  to  immaterialism  from  his  principles,  and 
grounds  his  own  belief  in  the  existence  of  an  external  material 
universe  solely  on  faith  in  Divine  Revelation.2 

It  only  remains  to  answer  certain  difficulties  urged  by  oc- 
casionalists  against  the  possibility  of  attributing  real  efficiency 
to  creatures. 

(i)  They  argue  that  efficient  causality  is  something  essenti- 
ally Divine,  and  therefore  cannot  be  communicated  to  creatures. 

1 "  Si  effectus  non  producuntur  ex  actione  rerum  creatarum,  sed  solum  ex  actione 
Dei,  impossibile  est  quod  per  effectus  manifestetur  virtus  alicujus  causae  creatae: 
non  enim  effectus  ostendit  virtutem  causae  nisi  ratione  actionis,  quae  a  virtute  pro- 
cedens  ad  effectum  terminatur.  Natura  autem  causae  non  cognoscitur  per  effectum, 
nisi  inquantum  per  ipsum  cognoscitur  virtus,  quae  naturam  consequitur.  Si  igitur 
res  creatae  non  habent  actiones  ad  producendum  effectum,  sequitur,  quod  nunquam 
naturam  alicujus  rei  creatae  poterit  cognosci  per  effectum ;  et  sic  subtrahitur  nobis 
omnis  cognitio  scientiae  naturalis,  in  qua  praecipuae  demonstrationes  per  effectum 
sequuntur." — ST.  THOMAS,  Contra  Gentes,  L.  Hi.,  cap.  69. 

2"  Je  demeure  d'accord  que  la  foi  oblige  a  croire  qu'il  y  a  des  corps  ;  mais,  pour 
residence,  il  me  semble  qu'elle  n'est  point  entiere,  et  que  nous  ne  sommes  point 
invinciblement  ported  a  croire  qu'il  y  ait  quelqu'  autre  chose  que  Dieu  et  notre 
Esprit." — Recherche  de  la  verite,  6me  e"claircissement, 


EFFICIENT  CAUSALITY  40! 

We  reply  that  while  the  absolutely  independent  causality  of 
the  First  Cause  is  essentially  Divine,  another  kind  or  order  of 
causality,  dependent  on  the  former,  but  none  the  less  real,  can 
be  and  is  communicated  to  creatures.  And  just  as  the  fact  that 
creatures  have  real  being,  real  existence,  distinct  from,  but  de- 
pendent on,  the  existence  of  the  Infinite  Being,  does  not  derogate 
from  the  supremacy  of  the  latter,  so  the  fact  that  creatures  have 
real  efficient  causality,  distinct  from,  but  dependent  on,  the 
causality  of  the  First  Cause,  does  not  derogate  from  the  latter's 
supremacy. 

(2)  They  urge  that  efficient  causality  is  creative,  and  therefore 
infinite  and  incommunicable. 

We  reply  that  there  is  a  plain  distinction  between  creative 
activity  and  the  efficient  activity  we  claim  for  creatures.  Creation 
is  the  production  of  new  being  from  nothingness.  God  alone, 
the  Infinite  Being,  can  create;  and,  furthermore,  according  to 
the  common  view  of  Theistic  philosophers  a  creature  cannot 
even  be  an  instrument  of  the  First  Cause  in  this  production  of 
new  being  from  nothingness.  And  the  main  reason  for  this 
appears  to  be  that  the  efficiency  of  the  creature,  acting,  of 
course,  with  the  Divine  concursus,  necessarily  presupposes  some 
pre-existing  being  as  material  on  which  to  operate,  and  is  con- 
fined to  the  change  or  determination  of  new  forms  or  modes  of  this 
pre-existing  reality.  Such  efficiency,  subordinate  to  the  Divine 
concursus  and  limited  to  such  an  order  of  effects,  is  plainly  dis- 
tinct from  creative  activity. 

(3)  But  the  creature,  acting  with  the  Divine  concursus,  either 
contributes  something  real  and  positive  to  the  effect  or  contri- 
butes nothing.     The  former  alternative  is  inadmissible,  for  God 
is  the  cause  of  everything  real  and  positive :  omne  novum  ens  est 
a  Deo.     And  in  the  latter  alternative,  which  is  the  true  one,  the 
concursus   is    superfluous ;  God  does  all ;  and  creatures  are  not 
really  efficient  causes. 

We  reply  that  the  former  alternative,  not  the  latter,  is  the 
true  one.  But  the  former  alternative  does  not  imply  that  the 
creature  produces  any  new  reality  independently  of  the  First 
Cause ;  nor  is  it  incompatible  with  the  truth  that  God  is  the 
author  and  cause  of  all  positive  reality :  omne  novum  ens  est  a 
Deo.  No  doubt,  were  we  to  conceive  the  co-operation  of  God 
and  the  creature  after  the  manner  of  the  co-operation  of  two  partial 
causes  of  the  same  order,  producing  by  their  joint  efficiency 

26 


402  ONTOLOGY 

some  one  total  effect — like  the  co-operation  of  two  horses  draw- 
ing a  cart, — it  would  follow  that  the  creature's  share  of  the  joint 
effect  would  be  independent  of  the  Divine  concursus  and  attri- 
butable to  the  creature  alone,  that  the  creature  would  produce 
some  reality  independently  of  the  First  Cause.  But  that  is  not 
the  way  in  which  the  First  Cause  concurs  with  created  causes. 
They  are  not  partial  causes  of  the  same  order.  Each  is  a  total 
cause  in  its  own  order.  They  so  co-operate  that  God,  besides 
having  created  and  now  conserving  the  second  cause,  and 
moving  the  latter's  power  to  act,  produces  Himself  the  whole 
effect  directly  and  immediately  by  the  efficiency  of  His  concursus ; 
while  at  the  same  time  the  second  cause,  thus  reduced  to  act, 
and  acting  with  the  concursus,  also  directly  and  immediately  pro- 
duces the  whole  effect.  There  is  one  effect,  one  change  in  facto 
esse,  one  change  in  fieri,  and  therefore  one  action  as  considered 
in  the  subject  changed,  since  the  action  takes  place  in  this 
latter :  actio  fit  in  passo.  This  change,  this  action  considered 
thus  passively,  or  "in passo"  is  the  total  term  of  each  efficiency, 
the  Divine  and  the  created,  not  partly  of  the  one  and  partly  of 
the  other.  It  is  one  and  indivisible;  it  is  wholly  due  to,  and 
wholly  attained  by,  each  efficiency ;  not,  however,  under  the  same 
formal  aspect.  We  may  distinguish  in  it  two  formalities  :  it  is  a 
novum  ens,  a  new  actuality,  something  positive  and  actual  super- 
added  to  the  existing  order  of  real,  contingent  being ;  but  it  is 
not. "being  in  general"  or  "actuality  in  general,"  it  is  some 
specifically,  nay  individually,  determinate  mode  of  actuality  or 
actual  being.  We  have  seen  that  it  is  precisely  because  every 
real  effect  has  the  former  aspect  that  it  demands  for  its  adequate 
explanation,  and  as  its  only  intelligible  source,  the  presence  and 
influence  of  a  purely  actual,  unchanging,  infinite,  inexhaustible 
productive  principle  of  all  actual  contingent  reality :  hence  the 
necessity  and  efficacy  of  the  Divine  concursus.  And  similarly 
it  is  because  the  new  actuality  involved  in  every  change  is  an 
individually  definite  mode  of  actuality  that  we  can  detect  in  it 
the  need  for,  and  the  efficacy  of,  the  created  cause :  the  nature 
of  this  latter,  the  character  and  scope  and  intensity  of  its  active 
power  is  what  determines  the  individuality  of  the  total  result, 
to  the  total  production  of  which  it  has  by  the  aid  of  the  Divine 
concursus  attained. 

(4)  But  God  can  Himself  produce  the  total  result  under  both 
formalities  without  any  efficiency  of  the  creature.     Therefore  the 


EFFICIENT  CA  USALIT  Y  403 

difficulty  remains  that  the  latter  efficiency  is  superfluous  and  use- 
less :  and  entia  non  sunt  multiplicanda  praeter  necessitatem. 

We  reply  that  as  a  matter  of  fact  the  effects  produced  in  the 
ordinary  course  of  nature  are  produced  by  God  under  both 
formalities ;  but  also  by  the  created  cause  under  both  formalities  : 
inasmuch  as  the  formalities  are  but  mentally  distinct  aspects  of 
one  real  result  which  is,  as  regards  its  extrinsic  causes,  individual 
and  indivisible.  The  distinction  of  these  formal  aspects  only 
helps  us  to  realize  how  de  facto  such  an  effect  is  due  to  the  co- 
operation of  the  First  Cause  and  created  causes.  That  God  could 
produce  all  such  effects  without  any  created  causes — we  must 
distinguish.  Some  such  effects  He  could  not  produce  without 
created  causes,  for  such  production  would  be  self-contradictory. 
He  could  not  produce,  for  instance,  a  volition  except  as  the  act 
of  a  created  will,  or  a  thought  except  as  the  act  of  a  created 
intellect,  or  a  vital  change  except  as  the  act  of  a  living  creature. 
But  apart  from  such  cases  which  would  involve  an  intrinsic  im- 
possibility, God  could  of  course  produce,  without  created  agents, 
the  effects  which  He  does  produce  through  their  created  efficiency. 
It  is,  however,  not  a  question  of  what  could  be,  but  of  what 
actually  is.  And  we  think  that  the  arguments  already  set  forth 
prove  conclusively  that  creatures  are  not  de  facto  the  inert,  inactive, 
aimless  and  unmeaning  things  they  would  be  if  Occasionalism 
were  the  true  interpretation  of  the  universe  of  our  actual 
experience  ;  but  that  these  creatures  are  in  a  true  sense  efficient 
causes,  and  that  just  as  by  their  very  co-existence  with  God,  as 
contingent  beings,  they  do  not  derogate  from  His  Infinite 
Actuality  but  rather  show  forth  His  Infinity,  so  by  their  co- 
operation with  Him  as  subordinate  and  dependent  efficient  causes 
they  do  not  derogate  from  His  supremacy  as  First  Cause,  but 
rather  show  forth  the  infinite  and  inexhaustible  riches  of  His 
Wisdom  and  Omnipotence. 


26 


CHAPTER  XV. 

FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER. 

1 06.  Two  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EXPERIENCE,  THE  MECHANICAL 
AND  THE  TELEOLOGICAL. — We  have  seen  that  all  change  in  the 
universe  demands  for  its  explanation  certain  real  principles,  viz. 
passive  potentiality,  actualization,  and  active  power  or  efficiency; 
in  other  words  that  it  points  to  material,  formal  and  efficient 
causes.  Do  these  principles  suffice  to  explain  the  course  of 
nature  to  the  inquiring  mind?  Mechanists  say,  Yes;  these 
principles  explain  it  so  far  as  it  is  capable  of  explanation. 
Teleologists  say,  No ;  these  principles  do  not  of  themselves  account 
for  the  universe  of  our  experience :  this  universe  reveals  itself  as 
a  cosmos :  hence  it  demands  for  its  explanation  real  principles  or 
causes  of  another  sort,  final  causes,  the  existence  of  which  implies 
purpose,  plan  or  design,  and  therefore  also  intelligence. 

The  problem  whether  or  not  the  universe  manifests  the  exist- 
ence and  influence  of  final  causes  has  been  sometimes  formulated 
in  this  striking  fashion  :  Is  it  that  birds  have  wings  in  order  to 
fly,  or  is  it  merely  that  they  fly  because  they  have  wings  ?  Such 
a  graphic  statement  of  the  problem  is  misleading,  for  it  suggests 
that  the  alternatives  are  mutually  exclusive,  that  we  must  vote 
either  for  final  causes  or  for  efficient  causes.  As  a  matter  of 
fact  we  accept  both.  Efficient  causes  account  for  the  course  of 
nature ;  but  they  need  to  be  determined  by  the  influence  of  final 
causes.  Moreover,  the  question  how  far  this  influence  of  final 
causes  extends — -finality  (finalitas),  as  it  is  technically  termed — is  a 
secondary  question ;  nor  does  the  advocate  of  final  causality  in 
the  universe  undertake  to  decide  its  nature  and  scope  in  every 
instance  and  detail,  any  more  than  the  physical  scientist  does  to 
point  out  all  the  physical  laws  embodied  in  an  individual  natural 
event,  or  the  biologist  to  say  whether  a  doubtful  specimen  of 
matter  is  organic  or  inorganic,  or  whether  a  certain  sort  of  living 
cell  is  animal  or  vegetable.  The  teleologist's  thesis,  as  against  that 

404 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  405 

of  mechanism,  is  simply  that  there  are  final  causes  in  the  universe, 
that  the  universe  does  really  manifest  the  presence  and  influence  of 
final  causes}- 

There  are  two  ways,  however,  of  conceiving  this  influence 
as  permeating  the  universe.  The  conception  of  final  causality 
in  general  is,  as  we  shall  see,  the  conception  of  acting  for  an  end, 
from  a  motive,  with  a  purpose,  plan  or  design  for  the  attainment  of 
something.  It  implies  arrangement,  ordination,  adaptation  of 
means  to  ends  (55).  Now  at  least  there  appears  to  be,  pervading 
the  universe  everywhere  and  directing  its  activities,  such  an 
adaptation.  The  admirable  equilibrium  offerees  which  secures  the 
regular  motions  of  the  heavenly  bodies ;  the  exact  mixture  of 
gases  which  makes  our  atmosphere  suitable  for  organic  life ;  the 
distance  and  relative  positions  of  the  sun  and  the  earth,  which 
secure  conditions  favourable  to  organic  life  ;  the  chemical  trans- 
formations whereby  inorganic  elements  and  compounds  go  to  form 
the  living  substance  of  plants  and  are  thus  prepared  for  assimila- 
tion as  food  by  animal  organisms ;  the  wonderfully  graded 
hierarchy  of  living  species  in  the  animate 'world,  and  the  mutual 
interdependence  of  plants  and  animals ;  the  endless  variety  of 
instincts  which  secure  the  preservation  and  well-being  of 
living  individuals  and  species ;  most  notably  the  adaptability  and 
adaptation  of  other  mundane  creatures  to  human  uses  by  man  him- 
self,— innumerable  facts  such  as  these  convince  us  that  the  things  of 
the  universe  are  useful  to  one  another,  that  they  are  constituted 
and  disposed  in  relation  to  one  another  as  if  they  had  been 
deliberately  chosen  to  suit  one  another,  to  fit  in  harmoniously  to- 
gether in  mutual  co-ordination  and  subordination  so  that  by  their 
interaction  and  interdependence  they  work  out  a  plan  or  design 
and  subserve  as  means  to  definite  ends.  This  suitability  of  things 
relatively  to  one  another,  this  harmony  of  the  nature  and  activity 
of  each  with  the  nature  and  activity  of  every  other,  we  may 
designate  as  extrinsic  finality.  The  Creator  has  willed  so  to 
arrange  and  dispose  all  creatures  in  conditions  of  space  and  time 
that  such  harmonious  but  purely  extrinsic  relations  of  mutual 
adaptation  do  de  facto  obtain  and  continue  to  prevail  between 
them  under  His  guidance. 

But  are  these  creatures  themselves,  in  their  own  individual 
natures,  equally  indifferent  to  any  definite  mode  of  action,  so  that 
the  orderly  concurrence  of  their  activities  is  due  to  an  initial  colloca- 
1  Qf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii,,  §  217. 


406  ONTOLOGY 

tion  and  impulse  divinely  impressed  upon  them  from  without, 
and  not  to  any  purposive  principle  intrinsic  to  themselves  individ- 
ually ?  Descartes,  Leibniz  and  certain  supporters  of  the  theory  of 
atomic  dynamism  regarding  the  constitution  of  matter,  while  re- 
cognizing a  relative  and  extrinsic  finality  in  the  universe  in  the 
sense  explained,  seem  to  regard  the  individual  agencies  of  the 
universe  as  mere  efficient  causes,  not  of  themselves  endowed  with 
any  immanent,  intrinsic  directive  principle  of  their  activities,  and 
so  contributing  by  mere  extrinsic  arrangement  to  the  order  of  the 
universe.  Scholastic  philosophers,  on  the  contrary,  following  the 
thought  of  Aristotle,1  consider  that  every  agency  in  the  universe 
is  endowed  with  an  intrinsic  principle  of  finality  which,  constantly 
directs  its  activities  towards  the  realization  of  a  perfection  which 
is  proper  to  it  and  which  constitutes  its  intrinsic  end  (45-46).  And 
while  each  thus  tends  to  its  own  proper  perfection  by  the  natural 
play  of  its  activities,  each  is  so  related  to  all  others  that  they  simul- 
taneously realize  the  extrinsic  purpose  which  consists  in  the  order 
and  harmony  of  the  whole  universe.  Thus  the  extrinsic  and  relative 
finality  whereby  all  conspire  to  constitute  the  universe  a  cosmos 
is  secondary  and  posterior  and  subordinate  to  the  deeper,  intrinsic, 
immanent  and  absolute  finality  whereby  each  individual  created 
nature  moves  by  a  tendency  or  law  of  its  being  towards  the  real- 
ization of  &  good  which  perfects  it  as  its  natural  end. 

In  order  to  understand  the  nature  of  this  intrinsic  and  extrinsic 
finality  in  the  universe,  and  to  vindicate  its  existence  against 
the  philosophy  of  Mechanism,  we  must  next  analyse  the  concept, 
and  investigate  the  influence,  of  what  are  called  final  causes. 

107.  THE  CONCEPT  OF  FINAL  CAUSE;  ITS  OBJECTIVE 
VALIDITY  IN  ALL  NATURE.  CLASSIFICATION  OF  FINAL  CAUSES.— 
When  we  speak  of  the  end  of  the  year,  or  the  end  of  a  wall,  we 
mean  the  extreme  limit  or  ultimate  point ;  and  the  term  conveys 
no  notion  of  a  cause.  Similarly,  were  a  person  to  say  "  I  have 
got  to  the  end  of  my  work,"  we  should  understand  him  to  mean 
simply  that  he  had  finished  it.  But  when  people  act  deliberately 
and  as  intelligent  beings,  they  usually  act  for  some  conscious  pur- 
pose, with  some  object  in  view,  for  the  achievement  or  attainment 
of  something  ;  they  continue  to  act  until  they  have  attained  this 
object ;  when  they  have  attained  it  they  cease  to  act ;  its  attain- 
ment synchronizes  with  the  end  of  their  action,  taking  this  term  in 
the  sense  just  illustrated.  Probably  this  is  the  reason  why  the  term 

.,v.,  17, 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  407 

end  has  been  extended  from  its  original  sense  to  signify  the 
object  for  the  attainment  of  which  an  intelligent  agent  acts.  This 
object  of  conscious  desire  induces  the  agent  to  seek  it ;  and  because 
it  thus  influences  the  agent  to  act  it  verifies  the  notion  of  a  cause  : 
it  is  &  final  cause,  an  end  in  the  causal  sense.  For  instance,  a  young 
man  wishes  to  become  a  medical  doctor :  the  art  of  healing  is  the 
end  he  wishes  to  secure.  For  this  purpose  he  pursues  a  course  of 
studies  and  passes  certain  examinations ;  these  acts  whereby  he 
qualifies  himself  by  obtaining  a  certain  fund  of  knowledge  and 
skill  are  means  to  the  end  intended  by  him.  He  need  not  desire 
these  preparatory  labours  for  their  own  sake ;  but  he  does  desire 
them  as  useful  for  his  purpose,  as  means  to  his  end  :  in  so  far  as 
he  wills  them  as  means  he  wills  them  not  for  their  own  sake  but 
because  of  the  end,  propter  finem.  He  apprehends  the  end  as /a 
good ;  he  intends  its  attainment ;  he  elects  or  selects  certain  acts  or 
lines  of  action  as  means  suitable  for  this  purpose.  An  end  or  final 
cause,  therefore,  may  be  defined  as  something  apprehended  as 
a  good,  and  which,  because  desired  as  such,  influences  the  will  to 
choose  some  action  or  line  of  action  judged  necessary  or  useful  for  the 
attainment  of  this  good.  Hence  Aristotle's  definition  of  end  as 
TO  ov  6V€/ca  :  id  cujus  gratia  aliquid  fit :  that  for  the  sake  of  which 
an  agent  acts. 

The  end  understood  in  this  sense  is  a  motive  of  action ;  not 
only  would  the  action  not  take  place  without  the  agent's  intending 
the  end,  showing  the  latter  to  be  a  conditio  sine  qua  non  ;  but, 
more  than  this,  the  end  as  a  good,  apprehended  and  willed,  has  a 
positive  influence  on  the  ultimate  effect  or  issue,  so  that  it  is  really 
a  cause. 

Man  is  conscious  of  this  "  finality,"  or  influence  of  final  causes 
on  his  own  deliberate  actions.  As  an  intelligent  being  he  acts  "  for 
ends,"  and  orders  or  regulates  his  actions  as  means  to  those  ends  ; 
so  much  so  that  when  we  see  a  man's  acts,  his  whole  conduct, 
utterly  unrelated  to  rational  ends,  wholly  at  variance  and  out  of 
joint  with  the  usual  ends  of  intelligent  human  activity,  we  take 
it  as  an  indication  of  loss  of  reason,  insanity.  Furthermore,  man 
is  free ;  he  chooses  the  ends  for  which  he  acts ;  he  acts  elective 
propter  fines. 

But  in  the  domain  of  animal  life  and  activity  is  there  any 
evidence  of  the  influence  of  final  causes?  Most  undoubtedly. 
Watch  the  movements  of  animals  seeking  their  prey;  observe 
the  wide  domain  of  animal  instincts ;  study  the  elaborate  and 


408  ONTOLOGY 

intricate  lines  of  action  whereby  they  protect  and  foster  and  pre- 
serve their  lives,  and  rear  their  young  and  propagate  their  species  : 
could  there  be  clearer  or  more  abundant  evidence  that  in  all  this 
conduct  they  are  influenced  by  objects  which  they  apprehend  and 
seek  as  sensible  goods  ?  Not  that  they  can  conceive  in  the  abstract 
the  ratio  bonitatis  in  these  things,  or  freely  choose  them  as  good,  for 
they  are  incapable  of  abstract  thought  and  consequent  free  choice  ; 
but  that  these  sensible  objects,  apprehended  by  them  in  the  con- 
crete, do  really  influence  or  move  their  sense  appetites  to  desire 
and  seek  them  ;  and  the  influence  of  an  object  on  sense  appetite 
springs  from  the  goodness  of  this  object  (44,  45).  They  tend 
towards  apprehended  goods  ;  they  act  apprehensive"  propter  finest 

Finally,  even  in  the  domains  of  unconscious  agencies,  of  plant 
life  and  inorganic  nature,  we  have  evidence  of  the  influence  of 
final  causes.  For  here  too  we  witness  innumerable  varied,  com- 
plex, ever-renewed  activities,  constantly  issuing  in  results  useful 
to,  and  good  for,  the  agents  which  elicit  them :  operations  which 
contribute  to  the  development  and  perfection  of  the  natures  of  these 
agents  (46).  Now  if  similar  effects  demand  similar  causes  how 
can  we  refuse  to  recognize  even  in  these  activities  of  physical 
nature  the  influence  of  final  causes  ?  Whenever  and  wherever  we 
find  a  great  and  complex  variety  of  active  powers,  forces,  energies, 
issuing  invariably  in  effects  which  suit  and  develop  and  perfect 
the  agents  in  question, — in  a  word,  which  are  good  for  these 
agents, — whether  the  latter  be  conscious  or  unconscious,  does 
not  reason  itself  dictate  to  us  that  all  such  domains  of  action 
must  be  subject  to  the  influence  of  final  causes  ?  Of  course  it 
would  be  mere  unreflecting  anthropomorphism  to  attribute  to 
unconscious  agencies  a  conscious  subjection  to  the  attracting  and 
directing  influence  of  such  causes.  But  the  recognition  of  such 
influence  in  this  domain  implies  no  na'fve  supposition  of  that 
sort.  It  does,  however,  imply  this  very  reasonable  view :  that 
there  must  be  some  reason  or  ground  in  the  nature  or  constitu- 
tion of  even  an  inanimate  agent  for  its  acting  always  in  a  uni- 
form manner,  conducive  to  its  own  development  and  perfection ; 
that  there  must  be  in  the  nature  of  each  and  every  one  of  the 

1 "  Quaedam  vero  ad  bonum  inclinantur  cum  aliqua  cognitione  ;  non  quidem 
sic  quod  cognoscant  ipsam  rationem  boni,  sed  cognoscunt  aliquod  bonum  particulare. 
.  .  .  Inclinatio  autem  hanc  cognitionem  sequens  dicitur  appetitus  sensitivus.  Quae- 
dam vero  inclinantur  ad  bonum  cum  cognitione  qua  cognoscant  ipsam  boni 
rationem  ;  et  haec  inclinatio  dicitur  voluntas." — ST.  THOMAS,  Sumtna  Theol.,  i.,  q. 
xlix.,  art.  i. 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  409 

vast  multitude  of  such  agents  which  make  up  the  whole  physical 
universe  a  reason  or  ground  for  each  co-operating  constantly  and 
harmoniously  with  all  the  others  to  secure  and  preserve  that 
general  order  and  regularity  which  enables  us  to  pronounce  the 
universe  not  a  chaos  but  a  cosmos.  Now  that  ground  or  reason 
in  things,  whereby  they  act  in  such  a  manner — not  indifferently, 
chaotically,  capriciously,  aimlessly,  unintelligibly,  but  definitely, 
regularly,  reliably,  purposively,  intelligibly — is  a  real  principle  of 
their  natures,  impressing  on  their  natures  a  definite  tendency, 
directive  of  their  activities  towards  results  which,  as  being  suited 
to  these  natures,  bear  to  these  latter  the  relation  of  final  causes. 
A  directive  principle  need  not  itself  be  conscious ;  the  inner 
directive  principle  of  inanimate  agents  towards  what  is  good  for 
them,  what  perfects  them,  what  is  therefore  in  a  true  and  real 
sense  their  end  (45,  46),  is  not  conscious.  But  in  virtue  of  it 
they  act  as  if  they  were  conscious,  nay  intelligent,  i.e.  they  act 
executM  propter  fines. 

Of  course  the  existence  of  this  principle  in  inanimate  agencies  necessarily 
implies  intelligence:  this  indeed  is  our  very  contention  against  the  whole 
philosophy  of  mechanism,  positivism  and  agnosticism.  But  is  this  intelligence 
really  identical  with  the  agencies  of  nature,  so  that  all  the  phenomena  of  ex- 
perience, which  constitute  the  cosmos  or  universe,  are  but  phases  in  the 
evolution  of  One  Sole  Reality  which  is  continually  manifesting  itself  under 
the  distinct  aspects  of  nature  and  mind?  Or  is  this  intelligence,  though 
virtually  immanent  in  the  universe,  really  distinct  from  it — really  transcendent, 
— a  Supreme  Intelligence  which  has  created  and  continues  to  conserve  this 
universe  and  govern  all  its  activities  ?  This  is  a  distinct  question :  it  is  the 
question  of  Monism  or  Theism  as  an  ultimate  interpretation  of  human  ex- 
perience. 

We  conclude  then  that  what  we  call  finality,  or  the  influence 
of  final  causes,  pervades  the  whole  universe ;  that  in  the  domain 
of  conscious  agents  it  is  conscious,  instinctive  when  it  solicits 
sense  appetite,  voluntary  when  it  solicits  intelligent  will ;  that  in 
the  domain  of  unconscious  agencies  it  is  not  conscious  but 
"  natural"  or  "physical"  soliciting  the  "  nature,"  or  "  appetitu s 
naturalis  "  of  these  agencies. 

Before  inquiring  into  the  nature  of  final  causality  we  may 
indicate  briefly  the  main  divisions  of  final  causes  :  some  of  these 
concern  the  domain  of  human  activity  and  are  of  importance  to 
Ethics  rather  than  to  Ontology. 

(a)  We  have  already  distinguished  between  intrinsic  and 
extrinsic  finality.  An  intrinsic  final  cause  is  an  end  or  object 


410  ONTOLOGY 

which  perfects  the  nature  itself  of  the  agent  which  tends  towards 
it :  nourishment,  for  instance,  is  an  intrinsic  end  in  relation  to 
the  living  organism.  An  extrinsic  final  cause  is  not  one  towards 
which  the  nature  of  the  agent  immediately  tends,  but  one  which, 
intended  by  some  other  agent,  is  de  facto  realized  by  the  tendency 
of  the  former  towards  its  own  intrinsic  end.  Thus,  the  general 
order  of  the  universe  is  an  extrinsic  end  in  relation  to  each 
individual  agency  in  the  universe :  it  is  an  end  intended  by  the 
Creator  and  de  facto  realized  by  each  individual  agency  acting  in 
accordance  with  its  own  particular  nature. 

(b)  Very  similar  to  this  is  the  familiar  distinction  between 
the  finis  operis  and  the  finis  operantis.     The  former  is  the  end 
necessarily  and  de  facto  realized  by  the  act  itself,  by  its  very 
nature,   independently  of  any   other  end   the  agent   may  have 
expressly  intended  to  attain  by  means  of  it.     The  latter  is  the 
end  expressly  intended  by  the  agent,  and  which  may  vary  for 
one  and  the  same  kind  of  act.     For  instance,  the  finis  operis  of 
an  act  of  almsgiving  is  the  actual  aiding  of  the  mendicant ;  the 
finis  operantis  may  be  charity,  or  self-denial,  or  vanity,  or  what- 
ever other  motive  influences  the  giver. 

(c)  Akin  to  those  also  is  the  distinction  between  an  uncon- 
scious, or  physical,  or  "  natural"  end,  and  a  conscious,  or  mental, 
or  "  intentional "  end.      The  former  is  that  towards  which  the 
nature  or  "  appetitus  naturalis  "  of  unconscious  agencies  tends; 
the  latter  is  an  end  apprehended  by  a  conscious  agent. 

(d)  An  end   may  be  either  ultimate  or  proximate  or  inter- 
mediate.     An  ultimate  end  is  one  which  is  sought  for  its  own 
sake,  as  contrasted  with  an  intermediate  end  which  is  willed 
rather  as  a  means  to  the  former,  and  with  a  proximate  end  which 
is  intended  last  and  sought  first  as  a  means  to  realizing  the 
others.      It  should   be  noted  that  proximate  and  intermediate 
ends,  in  so  far  as  they  are  sought  for  the  sake  of  some  ulterior 
end,  are  not  ends  at  all  but  rather  means ;  only  in  so  far  as  they 
present  some  good  desirable  for  its  own  sake,  are  they  properly 
ends,  or  final  causes.     Furthermore,  an  ultimate  end  may  be  such 
absolutely  or  relatively :  absolutely  if  it  cannot  possibly  be  sub- 
ordinated or  referred  to  any  ulterior  or  higher  good ;  relatively 
if,  though  ultimate  in  a  particular  order  as  compared  with  means 
leading  up  to  it,  it  is  nevertheless  capable  of  being  subordinated 
to  a  higher  good,  though  not  actually  referred  to  this  latter  by 
any  explicit  volition  of  the  agent  that  seeks  it. 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  411 

(e)  We  can  regard  the  end  for  which  an  agent  acts  either 
objectively, — finis    "  objectivus" — or  formally,— finis    "forma/ts". 
The  former  is  the  objective  good  itself  which  the  agent  wishes 
to  realize,   possess  or  enjoy ;  the  latter  is  the  act  whereby  the 
agent  formally   secures,  appropriates,   unites  himself  with,  this 
objective  good.     Thus,  God  Himself  is  the  objective  happiness 
(beatitudo  objective?)  of  man,  while  man's  actual  possession  of,  or 
union  with,  God,  by  knowledge  and  love,  is  man's  formal  happi- 
ness (beatitudo  formalis). 

(f)  We  may  distinguish  also  between  the  real  end  (finis  ' '  qui" 
or  " cujus" ',  and  the  personal  end  (finis  "cut").     The  former  is 
the  good  which  the  agent  desires,  the  good  for  the  sake  of  which 
("  cujus"  gratia)  he  acts.     The  latter  is  the  subject  or  person  & 
whom  he  wishes  this  good,  or  for  whom  he  wishes  to  procure  it. 
Thus,  a  labourer  may  work  to  earn  a  sustenance  for  himself  or  also 
for  his  family.     The  real  and  the  personal  end  are  never  willed 
separately,  but  always  as  one  concrete  good. 

(g)  The  distinction  between  a  principal  end  and  an  accessory 
end  (motivum  "  impulsivum  ")  is  obvious.    The  former  can  move  to 
act  of  itself  without  the  latter,  but  the  latter  strengthens  the  in- 
fluence of  the  former.     A  really  charitable  person,  while  effica- 
ciously moved  to  give  alms  by  sympathy  with  the  poor,  may 
not  be  uninfluenced  by  vanity  to  let  others  know  of  his  charity. 

(h)  Finally  we  may  note  the  theological  distinction  between  the  natural 
end,  and  the  supernatural  end,  of  man  as  a  rational  and  moral  agent.  The 
former  is  the  end  due  to  man's  nature,  the  latter  is  an  end  which  is  gratuitous 
and  undue  to  his  nature.  God  might  not  have  created  the  world  or  man,  and 
in  this  sense  even  the  natural  end  of  man  is  a  gratuitous  gift  of  God ;  but 
granted  that  God  did  decree  to  create  the  world  and  man,  an  end  corres- 
ponding to  man's  nature  and  powers  was  due  to  him :  the  knowledge,  service 
and  love  of  God  as  known  to  man  by  the  light  of  natural  reason.  But  as 
a  matter  of  fact  God,  in  His  actual  providence,  has  decreed  for  man  an  in- 
comparably higher  and  purely  gratuitous  end,  an  end  revealed  to  man  by 
God  Himself,  an  end  entirely  undue  not  only  to  man  but  to  any  and 
every  possible  creature  :  the  Beatific  Vision  of  the  Divine  Essence  for  ever  in 
heaven. 

1 08.  CAUSALITY  OF  THE  FINAL  CAUSE  ;  RELATION  OF  THE 
LATTER  TO  EFFICIENT,  FORMAL,  AND  MATERIAL  CAUSES. — We 
can  best  analyse  the  influence  of  the  final  cause  by  studying  this 
influence  as  exerted  on  conscious  and  intelligent  agents.  The 
final  cause  has  a  positive  influence  of  some  sort  on  the  produc- 
tion, happening,  actualization  of  effects.  What  is  the  nature  of 
this  influence  ?  The  final  cause  exerts  its  influence  by  being  a 


412  ONTOLOGY 

good,  an  apprehended  good ;  it  exerts  this  influence  on  the  appe- 
tite of  the  agent,  soliciting  the  latter  to  perform  certain  acts  for 
the  realization,  attainment,  possession,  or  enjoyment  of  this 
good.  But  it  must  not  be  conceived  as  the  efficient  cause  of  this 
movement  of  the  appetite,  nor  may  its  influence  be  conceived  as 
action.  An  efficient  cause  must  actually  exist  in  order  to  act ; 
but  when  the  final  cause,  as  an  apprehended  good,  exerts  its 
influence  on  the  appetite  it  is  not  yet  actual :  not  until  the  agent, 
by  his  action,  has  realized  the  end  and  actually  attained  it,  does 
the  end,  as  a  good,  actually  exist.  We  must  distinguish  between 
the  end  as  attained  9XM&  the  end  as  intended,  between  the  Jim's  in 
executione  and  the  Jim's  in  intentione.  It  is  not  the  end  as  attained 
that  is  a  final  cause ;  as  attained  it  is  an  effect  pure  and  simple. 
It  is  the  end  as  intended  that  is  a  final  cause  \  and  as  intended  it 
does  not  yet  actually  exist :  hence  its  influence  cannot  be  by 
way  of  action.  Perhaps  it  is  the  idea  or  cognition  of  the  intended 
end  that  exerts  the  peculiar  influence  of  final  cause  ?  No ;  the 
idea  or  cognition  of  the  end  actually  exists,  no  doubt,  in  the  con- 
scious agent,  but  this  is  only  a  condition,  a  conditio  sine  qua  non^ 
for  the  apprehended  good,  the  final  cause,  to  exert  its  influence : 
nilvolitum  nisi praecognitum .  It  is  not  the  cognition  of  the  good, 
however,  that  moves  the  agent  to  act,  it  is  not  the  idea  of  the 
good  that  the  agent  desires  or  strives  for,  but  the  good  itself. 
It  is  the  good  itself,  the  known  good,  that  exerts  the  influence, 
and  this  influence  consists  in  the  passive  inclination  or  attraction 
or  tendency  of  the  appetite  towards  the  good  :  a  tendency  which 
necessarily  results  from  the  very  presence  of  the  good  (not  really 
or  physically  of  course,  but  representatively,  mentally,  "  intention- 
ally" by  " esse  intentionale"  \  cf.  4)  in  the  agent's  consciousness, 
and  which  is  formally  the  actualization  of  the  causal  power  or 
influence  of  the  final  cause.  "  Just  as  the  efficient  cause  influences 
by  acting,"  says  St.  Thomas,1  "so  the  final  cause  influences  by 
being  yearned  for  and  desired  ". 

Looked  at  from  the  side  of  the  agent  that  undergoes  it,  this 
influence  is  a  passive  yielding :  this  next  becomes  an  active 
motion  of  appetite ;  and  in  the  case  of  free  will  a  deliberate  act 
of  intending  the  end,  followed  by  acts  of  choosing  means,  and 
finally  by  acts  commanding  the  executive  faculties  to  employ 
these  means. 

1 "  Sicut  influere  causae  efficients  est  agere,  ita  influere  causae  finalis  est 
appeti  et  desiderari  " — De  Veritate,  q.  xxii.,  art,  2, 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  413 

Looked  at  from  the  side  of  the  final  cause,  the  influence  consists 
in  an  attraction  of  appetite  towards  union  with  itself  as  a  good. 
The  matter  cannot  be  analysed  much  further  ;  nor  will  imagin- 
ation images  help  us  here  any  more  than  in  the  case  of  efficient 
causality.  It  must  be  noted,  however,  that  the  influence  of  the 
final  cause  is  the  influence  not  of  a  reality  as  actual ,  or  in  its  esse 
actuate,  but  of  a  reality  as  present  to  a  perceiving  mind,  or  in  its 
esse  intentionale.  At  the  same  time  it  would  be  a  mistake  to 
infer  from  this  that  the  influence  of  the  final  cause  is  not  real. 
It  is  sometimes  described  as  "intentional  "  causality,  ' ' causalitas 
intentionalis  " ;  but  this  must  not  be  taken  to  mean  that  it  is  not 
real:  for  it  is  not  the  "esse  intentionale"  of  the  good,  i.e.  the 
cognition  of  the  good,  its  presence  in  the  mind  or  consciousness 
of  the  agent,  that  moves  the  tatter's  appetite  :  it  is  the  apprehended 
good,  apprehended  as  real,  as  possible  of  actual  attainment,  that 
moves  the  agent  to  act.  The  influence  may  not  be  physical  in 
the  sense  of  being  productive  of,  or  interchangeable  with,  or  measur- 
able by,  corporeal  energy,  or  in  terms  of  mechanical  work  ;  nor  is 
it ;  but  it  is  none  the  less  real. 

But  if  the  influence  of  a  final  cause  really  reaches  to  the  effect 
of  the  agent's  actions  only  through  the  medium  of  the  latter' s 
appetite,  and  therefore  through  a  link  of  "  intentional "  causality, 
does  it  not  at  once  follow  that  the  attribution  of  final  causality  to 
the  domain  of  unconscious  and  inorganic  activities,  can  be  at 
best  merely  metaphorical  ?  The  attribution  to  such  agencies  of 
an  " appetitus  naturalis"  is  intelligible  indeed  as  a  striking  and 
perhaps  not  unpoetic  metaphor.  But  to  contend  that  it  is  any- 
thing more  than  a  metaphor,  to  claim  seriously  that  inanimate 
agencies  are  swayed  and  influenced  by  "  ends," — is  not  this  really 
to  substitute  mysticism  and  mystery  for  rational  speculation  and 
analysis? 

Mechanists  are  wont  to  dismiss  the  doctrine  of  final  causes 
in  the  physical  universe  with  offhand  charges  of  this  kind.  They 
are  but  too  ready  to  attribute  it  to  a  mystical  attitude  of  mind. 
Final  causes,  they  say,  are  not  discovered  in  inanimate  nature  by 
the  cold,  calculating,  unemotional  analysis  to  which  reason  submits 
its  activities,  but  are  read  into  it  by  minds  which  allow  themselves 
to  be  prompted  by  the  imagination  and  emotions  to  personify  and 
anthropomorphize  inanimate  agencies.  The  accusation  is  as  plaus- 
ible as  it  is  unjust.  It  is  plausible  because  the  attribution  of  final 
causes  to  inanimate  nature,  and  of  an  "appetitus  naturalis"  to 


414  ONTOLOGY 

its  agencies,  seems  to  imply  the  recognition  of  conscious,  mental, 
"  intentional "  influence  in  this  domain.  But  it  really  implies 
nothing  of  the  sort ;  and  hence  the  injustice  of  the  charge.  What 
it  does  imply  is  the  existence  of  a  genuine  analogy  between  the 
nature  and  natural  activities  of  physical  agencies  on  the  one  hand 
and  the  appetite  and  appetitive  activities  of  conscious  agencies  on 
the  other.  The  existence  of  this  analogy  is  absolutely  undeniable. 
The  orderly,  invariable  and  uniformly  suitable  character  of  phy- 
sical activities,  simply  forces  our  reason  to  recognize  in  physical 
agencies  natures  which  tend  towards  their  development,  and 
which  by  their  activities  attain  to  what  is  good  for  them,  to  what 
perfects  them.  In  other  words  we  have  to  recognize  that  each  by 
its  natural  line  of  activity  attains  to  results  that  are  good  and 
useful  to  it  just  as  if  it  apprehended  them  as  such  and  consciously 
tended  towards  them.  The  analogy  is  there ;  and  the  recognition 
of  it,  so  far  from  being  a  "  mystic  "  interpretation  of  facts,  is  an 
elementary  logical  exercise  of  our  reasoning  faculty.  The  schol- 
astics emphasized  their  recognition  of  the  analogy  by  calling  the 
nature  of  an  unconscious  agent, — the  principle  of  its  active  tend- 
encies towards  the  realization  of  its  own  perfection — an  "  appetitus 
naturalis  "  :  an  expression  into  which  no  one  familiar  with  schol- 
astic terminology  would  venture  to  read  any  element  of  mysticism.1 
Every  separate  agency  in  nature  has  a  uniform  mode  of 
activity;  by  following  out  this  line  of  action  each  co-operates 
with  all  the  others  in  maintaining  the  orderly  course  of  nature. 
These  are  facts  which  call  for  explanation.  They  are  not  ex- 
plained by  the  supposition  of  mechanists  that  these  agencies  are 
mere  efficient  causes  :  efficient  causality  does  not  account  for  order, 
it  has  got  simply  nothing  to  do  with  order  or  regularity.  Con- 
sequently the  last  word  of  the  mechanical  philosophy  on  the  fact 
of  order  in  the  universe  is — Agnosticism.  In  opposition  to  this 
attitude  we  are  far  from  contending  that  there  is  no  mystery,  or 
that  all  is,  clear  either  in  regard  to  the  fact  of  change  or  the  fact 
of  regularity.  Just  as  we  cannot  explain  everything  in  efficient 
causality,  so  neither  can  we  explain  everything  in  final  causality. 
But  we  do  contend  that  the  element  of  order,  development, 
evolution,  even  in  the  physical  universe,  can  be  partially  ex- 

1  In  its  modern  usage  the  term  "  intention  "  is  inseparable  from  the  notion  of 
conscious  direction.  The  scholastics  used  the  term  "  intentio  "  in  a  wider  and 
deeper  sense  to  connote  the  natural  tendency  of  all  created  agencies  towards  their 
natural  activities  and  lines  of  development.  And  in  unconscious  agencies  they  did 
not  hesitate  to  refer  to  it  as  "  intentio  naturae  "  or  "  appetitus  naturalis  ". 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  415 

plained  by  recognizing  in  its  several  agencies  a  nature^  a  principle 
of  development,  a  passive  inclination  implanted  in  the  very  being 
of  these  agencies  by  the  Intelligent  Author  of  their  being. 

In  conscious  agencies  this  inclination  or  tendency  to  actions 
conformable  or  connatural  to  their  being  is  not  always  in  act ;  it 
is  aroused  by  conscious  cognition,  perception,  or  imagination  of 
a  goody  and  operates  intermittently.  In  unconscious  agencies  it 
is  congenital  and  constantly  in  act,  i.e.  as  a  tendency,  not  as 
actually  operative  :  for  its  actual  development  due  conditions  of 
environment  are  required  :  the  seed  will  not  grow  without  a  suit- 
able soil,  temperature,  moisture,  etc.  In  conscious  agencies 
the  tendency,  considered  entitatively  or  as  a  reality  in  them,  is  an 
accidental  form ;  in  unconscious  agencies  it  is  their  forma  sub- 
stantialiS)  the  formative  substantial  principle,  which  determines 
the  specific  type  to  which  their  nature  belongs.1 

In  all  agencies  the  inclination  or  appetite  or  tendency  to  action 
arises  from  a  form  ;  an  elicited  appetite  from  an  "  intentional " 
form,  a  natural  appetite  from  a  "  natural "  form  :  Omnis  inclinatio 
seu  appetitus  cons  equitur  for  mam  ;  appetitus  elicitus  formam  inten- 
tionalem,  appetitus  naturalis  formam  naturalem.  The  scholastic 
view  that  final  causality  pervades  all  things  is  expressed  in  the 
aphorism,  Omne  agens  agit propter finem  :  Every  agency  acts  for 
an  end. 

From  our  analysis  of  final  causality  it  will  be  seen  that  the 
"  end  "  becomes  a  cause  by  exercising  its  influence  on  the  agent 
or  efficient  cause,  and  thus  initiating  the  action  of  the  latter.  We 
have  seen  already  that  material  and  formal  causes  exercise  their 
causality  dependency  on  the  efficient  cause  of  the  change  or 
effect  produced  by  the  latter.  We  now  see  that  the  final  cause, 
the  end  as  intended,  determines  the  action  of  the  efficient  cause ; 
hence  its  causality  holds  the  primacy  as  compared  with  that  of 
the  other  causes :  it  is  in  this  sense  the  cause  of  causes,  causa 
causarum?  But  while  the  end  as  intended  is  the  starting  point  of 

"  Res  naturalis  per/ormam  qua  perficitur  in  sua  specie,  habet  inclinationem  in 
proprias  operationes  et  proprium  finem,  quern  per  operationes  consequitur ;  quale 
enim  unumquodque  est,  talia  operatur,  et  in  sibi  convenientia  tendit." — ST.  THOMAS, 
Contra  Gentes,  iv.,  19. 

"  Omnia  suo  modo  per  appetitum  inclinantur  in  bonum,  sed  diversimode.  Quae- 
dam  enim  inclinantur  in  bonum  per  solam  naturalem  habitudinem  absque  cognitione, 
sicut  plantae  et  corpora  inanimata ;  et  talis  inclinatio  ad  bonum  vocatur  appetitus 
naturalis." — Summa  TheoL,  i.,  q.  xlix.,  art.i. 

2  Causa  efficiens  et  finis  sibi  correspondent  invicem,  quia  efficiens  est  prin- 
cipium  motus,  finis  autem  terminus.  Et  similiter  materia  et  forma  :  nam  forma  dat 


416  ONTOLOGY 

the  whole  process,  the  end  as  attained  is  the  ultimate  term  of  the 
latter.  Hence  the  scholastic  aphorism :  Finis  est  primus  in 
intentione  et  uttimus  in  executione.  And  this  is  true  where  the 
process  involves  a  series  of  acts  attaining  to  means  subordinate  to 
an  end  :  this  latter  is  the  first  thing  intended  and  the  last  attained. 

The  final  cause,  the  end  as  intended,  is  extrinsic  to  the  effect. 
It  is  intrinsic  to  the  efficient  cause.  It  is  a  "forma "  or  deter- 
minative principle  of  the  latter  :  a  forma  intentionalis  in  conscious 
agents,  a  forma  naturalis  in  unconscious  agents. 

109.  NATURE  AND  THE  LAWS  OF  NATURE.  CHARACTER  AND 
GROUNDS  OF  THEIR  NECESSITY  AND  UNIVERSALITY.  SCIEN- 
TIFIC DETERMINISM  AND  PHILOSOPHIC  FATALISM.— By  the 
term  nature  we  have  seen  that  Aristotle  and  the  scholastics 
meant  the  essence  or  substance  of  an  agent  regarded  as  inner 
principle  of  the  latter's  normal  activities,  as  determining  the 
bent  or  inclination  of  these,  and  therefore  as  in  a  real  sense  their 
final  cause.  Hence  Aristotle's  definition  of  nature  as  a  certain 
principle  or  cause  of  the  motion  and  rest  of  the  thing  in 
which  that  principle  is  rooted  fundamentally  and  essentially 
and  not  merely  accidentally}  The  scholastics,  recognizing 
that  this  intentio  naturae,  this  subjection  to  finality,  in  unconscious 
agencies  must  be  the  work  and  the  index  of  intelligence,  in  other 
words  that  this  analogical  finality  in  inanimate  things  must  con- 
note a  proper  finality,  a  properly  purposive  mode  of  action,  in 
the  author  of  these  things,  conceived  this  nature  or  intentio 
naturae  as  the  impression  of  a  divine  art  or  plan  upon  the  very 
being  of  all  creatures  by  the  Creator  Himself.  Hence  St.  Thomas's 
profound  and  well-known  description  of nature  as  "  the  principle  of 
a  divine  art  impressed  upon  things,  in  virtue  of  which  they  move 
towards  determinate  ends" .  Defining  art  &s  the  just  conception 

esse,  materia  autem  recipit.  Est  igitur  efficiens  causa  finis,  finis  autem  causa 
efficientis.  Efficiens  est  causa  finis  quantum  ad  esse,  quidem,  quia  movendo 
perducit  efficiens  ad  hoc,  quod  sit  finis.  Finis  autem  est  causa  efficientis  non 
quantum  ad  esse  sed  quantum  ad  rationem  causalitatis.  Nam  efficiens  est  causa  in 
quantum  agit ;  non  autem  agit  nisi  causa  [gratia]  finis.  Unde  ex  fine  habet  suam 
causalitatem  efficiens."— ST.  THOMAS,  In  Metaph.,  v.,  2. 

"  Sciendum  quod  licet  finis  sit  ultimus  in  esse  in  quibusdam,  in  causalitate 
tamen  est  prior  semper,  unde  dicitur  causa  causarum,  quia  est  causa  causalitatis  in 
omnibus  causis.  Est  enim  causa  causalitatis  efficientis,  ut  jam  dictum  est. 
Efficiens  autem  est  causa  causalitatis  et  materiae  et  formae." — ibid.,  lect.  3. 

1  *u<ns  effriv  apx^)  rls  Kal  alrla  rov  Kive'iffQai  Kal  ypepf'iv  tv  $  virapx*!-  Tp<*>T(as 
/cofl'ovTo,  Ko.1  fjL^j  Kara  ffvp.fte&iiK&s.  Natura  est  principium  quoddam  et  causa  cur  id 
moveatur  et  quiescat,  in  quo  inest  primum,  per  se  et  non  secundum  accidens. — 
Physic.,  L.  ii.,  cap.  i. 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  417 

of  external  works  to  be  accomplished^-  he  observes  that  nature  is 
a  sort  of  art :  "as  if  a  ship-builder  were  to  endow  his  materials 
with  the  power  of  moving  and  adapting  themselves  so  as  to  form 
or  construct  a  ship  ".2  And  elsewhere  he  remarks  that  nature 
differs  from  art  only  in  this  that  the  former  is  an  intrinsic,  the 
latter  an  extrinsic,  principle  of  the  work  which  is  accomplished 
through  its  influence  :  so  that  if  the  art  whereby  a  ship  is  con- 
structed were  intrinsic  to  the  materials,  the  ship  would  be 
constructed  by  nature  as  it  actually  is  by  art.3 

Such,  then,  is  the  teleological  conception  of  the  nature  of  each 
individual  agency  in  the  universe.  When  we  speak  of  "  universal 
nature"  "  external  nature''  "  physical  nature?  "the  course  of 
nature"  "the  laws  of  nature"  etc.  we  are  using  the  term  in  a 
collective  sense  to  signify  the  sum-total  of  all  the  agencies  which 
constitute  the  whole  physical  universe ;  and  furthermore  in  all 
such  contexts  we  usually  understand  by  nature  the  world  of 
corporeal  things  as  distinct  from  the  domain  of  mind  or  spirit. 

The  proof  of  this  view, — that  the  agencies  of  the  physical 
universe  are  not  merely  efficient  causes,  but  that  they  act  under  the 
influence  of  ends ;  that  they  have  definite  lines  of  action  which 
are  natural  to  them,  and  whereby  they  realize  their  own  indivi- 
dual development  and  the  maintenance  of  the  universe  as  a 
cosmos ;  that  by  doing  so  they  reveal  the  influence  of  intelligent 
purpose^ — the  proof  of  this  view  lies,  as  we  have  seen,  in  the  fact 
that  their  activities  are  regular,  uniform,  and  mutually  useful,  or, 
in  other  words,  that  they  are  productive  of  order  (\\o).  Bearing 
this  in  mind  let  us  inquire  into  the  various  meanings  discernible 
in  the  very  familiar  expressions,  "  laws  of  nature,"  "  physical  laws," 
"  natural  laws  ". 4 

1  "  Ars  nihil  aliud  est  quam  recta  ratio  aliquorum  operum  faciendorum." — 
Summa  Theol.  i»  iiae,  q.  Ivii.,  art.  3. — Cf.  In  Post.  Anal.,  1.  I. 

2  Natura  nihil  aliud  est  quam  ratio  cujusdam  artis,  scilicet  divinae,  indita  rebus 
qua  ipsae  res  moventur  ad  finem  determinatum  ;  sicut  si  artifex  factor  navis  posset 
lignis  tribuere  quod  ex  seipsis  moverentur  ad  navis  formam  inducendam." — In  II 
Pkys.,  lect.  14. 

"  Omnia  naturalia,  in  ea  quae  eis  conveniunt,  sunt  inclinata,  habentia  in  seipsis 
aliquod  inclinationis  principium,  ratione  cujus  eorum  inclinatio  naturalis  est,  ita 
ut  quodammodo  ipsa  vadant,  et  non  solum  ducantur  in  fines  debitos." — De  Veritate,  q. 
xxii.,  art.  7. 

3  "  In  nullo  enim  alio  natura  ab  arte  videtur  differre,  nisi  quia  natura  est  prin- 
cipium intrinsecum,  et  ars  est  principium  extrinsicum.     Si  enim  ars  factiva  navis 
esset  intrinseca  ligno,  facta  fuisset  navis  a  natura,  sicut  modo  fit  ab  arte." — In  II. 
Phys.,  lect.  13. 

4  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §  217. 

27 


4i8  ONTOLOGY 

We  may  understand  firstly  by  a  law  of  nature  this  innate 
tendency  we  have  been  describing  as  impressed  upon  the  very 
being  of  all  created  things  by  the  Creator.  It  is  in  this  sense 
we  speak  of  a  thing  acting  "naturally,"  or  "according  to  the 
law  of  its  nature,"  or  "  according  to  its  nature,"  when  we  see 
it  acting  according  to  what  we  conceive  to  be  the  end  intended 
for  it,  acting  in  a  manner  conducive  to  the  development  of  its 
own  individuality,  the  preservation  of  its  specific  type  or  kind, 
and  the  fulfilment  of  its  role  in  the  general  scheme  of 
things.  What  this  " natural"  mode  of  action  is  for  this  par- 
ticular kind  of  thing,  we  gather  from  our  experience  of  the 
regular  or  normal  activity  of  things  of  its  kind.  Thus,  we 
say  it  is  a  law  of  oxygen  and  hydrogen  to  combine  in  definite 
proportions,  under  suitable  conditions,  to  form  water  ;  a  law  of 
all  particles  of  matter  in  the  universe  to  tend  to  move  towards  one 
another  with  a  definite  acceleration  ;  a  law  of  living  organisms  to 
reproduce  their  kind.  This  usage  comes  nearest  to  the  original 
meaning  of  the  term  law :  a  precept  or  command  imposed  on 
intelligent  agents  by  a  superior.  For  we  conceive  this  natural 
tendency  impressed  on  physical  agencies  by  the  Creator  after  the 
analogy  of  a  precept  or  command.  And  we  have  good  reason 
to  do  so:  because  uniformity  of  conduct  in  intelligent  agents  is 
the  normal  result  of  their  obedience  to  a  law  imposed  upon  them  ; 
and  we  see  in  the  activities  of  the  physical  universe  an  all-per- 
vading feature  of  regularity. 

Secondly,  we  transfer  the  term  law  to  this  result  itself  of  the 
natural  tendency  of  the  being,  of  the  convergence  of  its  activities 
towards  its  end.  That  is  to  say,  we  call  the  uniform  mode  of 
action  of  an  agent  a  law  of  nature,  a  natural  or  physical  law. 
This  usage,  which  is  common  in  the  positive  sciences,  implies  a 
less  profound,  a  more  superficial,  but  a  perfectly  legitimate  mode 
of  apprehending  and  studying  the  changes  and  phenomena  of  the 
physical  universe. 

Thirdly,  since  the  several  agencies  of  the  universe  co-exist  in 
time  and  space,  since  they  constantly  interact  on  one  another, 
since  for  the  exercise  of  the  natural  activities  of  each  certain 
extrinsic  conditions  of  relationship  with  its  environment  must  be 
fulfilled,  an  accurate  knowledge  and  exact  formulation  of  these 
relations  are  obviously  requisite  for  a  scientific  and  practial  in- 
sight into  the  mode  of  activity  of  any  natural  agency.  In  fact 
the  physical  scientist  may  and  does  take  for  granted  the  natural 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  419 

tendency  and  the  uniformity  of  action  resulting  therefrom,  and 
confines  himself  to  discovering  and  formulating  the  relations  between 
any  given  kind  of  action  and  the  extrinsic  conditions  requisite  for 
its  exercise.  Such,  for  instance,  would  be  any  chemical  "  law  " 
setting  forth  the  measure,  and  the  conditions  of  temperature, 
pressure,  etc.,  in  which  certain  chemical  elements  combine  to 
form  a  certain  chemical  compound.  To  all  such  formulae  scien- 
tists give  the  title  of  physical  laws,  or  laws  of  physical  nature.  These 
formulae,  descriptive  of  the  manner  in  which  a  phenomenon  takes 
place,  setting  forth  with  the  greatest  possible  quantitative  exactness 
the  phenomenal  factors *  that  enter  into  and  precede  and  accom- 
pany it,  are  laws  in  a  still  more  superficial  and  still  less  philosoph- 
ical sense,  but  a  sense  which  is  most  commonly — and  justly — ac- 
cepted in  the  positive  or  physical  sciences. 

Before  examining  the  feature  and  characteristic  of  necessity  and  uni- 
versality which  enters  into  all  these  various  conceptions  of  a  "physical  law  " 
we  have  here  to  observe  that  it  would  make  for  clearness,  and  for  a  better 
understanding  between  physics  and  metaphysics,  between  science  and 
philosophy,  between  the  investigator  who  seeks  by  observation  and  experiment 
for  the  proximate  phenomenal  conditions  and  "  physical  "  causes  of  phenomena, 
and  the  investigator  who  seeks  for  the  ultimate  real  ground  and  explanation 
of  thqse  latter  by  speculative  analysis  of  them,  and  by  reasoning  from  the 
scientist's  discoveries  about  them, — if  it  were  understood  and  agreed  that  in- 
vestigation into  the  scope  and  significance  and  ultimate  ground  of  this  feature 
of  stability  in  the  laws  of  physical  nature  belongs  to  the  philosopher  rather 
than  to  the  scientist.  We  have  already  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  the 
propriety  of  such  an  obviously  reasonable  and  intelligible  division  of  labour  is 
almost  universally  admitted  in  theory  both  by  scientists  and  by  philosophers  ; 
though,  infortunately,  it  is  not  always  remembered  in  practice  (100). 

In  theory  the  scientist  assumes,  and  very  properly  assumes,  that  the 
agencies  with  which  he  deals  are  not  capricious,  unreliable,  irregular,  but 
stable,  reliable,  regular  in  their  mode  of  action,  that  in  similar  sets  of  con- 
ditions and  circumstances  they  will  act  uniformly.  Without  inquiring  into 
the  ultimate  grounds  of  this  assumption  he  premises  that  all  his  conclusions, 
all  his  inductive  generalizations  about  the  activity  of  these  agencies,  will  hold 
good  of  these  latter  just  in  so  far  as  they  do  act  according  to  his  general 
postulate  as  to  their  regularity.  He  then  proceeds,  by  the  inductive  pro- 
cesses of  hypothesis  and  experimental  verification,  to  determine  what  agencies 
produce  such  or  such  an  event,  under  what  conditions  they  bring  this  about, 
what  are  all  the  phenomenal  conditions,  positive  and  negative,  antecedent  and 
concomitant,  in  the  absence  of  any  one  of  which  this  event  will  not  happen, 
and  in  the  presence  of  all  of  which  it  will  happen.  These  are,  in  accordance 
with  his  assumption,  determining  causes  of  the  event ;  the  knowledge  of 
them  is  from  the  speculative  point  of  view  extremely  important,  and  from  the 
practical  standpoint  of  invention  and  applied  science  extremely  useful.  As  a 

1 C/.  Science  of  Logic,  ii,  §  227. 
27* 


420  ONTOLOGY 

scientist  he  has  no  other  knowledge  in  view  :  he  aims  at  discovering  the 
"how,"  the  guomodo,  of  natural  phenomena, — how,  for  instance,  under  what 
conditions  and  in  what  measure,  water  is  produced  from  oxygen  and  hydrogen. 
When  he  has  discovered  all  these  positive  and  negative  conditions  his  scientific 
knowledge  of  the  formation  of  water  is  complete. 

But  there  are  other  questions  in  regard  to  natural  phenomena  to  which 
the  experimental  methods  of  the  positive  sciences  can  offer  no  reply.  They 
can  tell  us  nothing  about  the  wider  "how  "  which  resolves  itself  into  a  "why." 
They  can  give  no  information  about  the  ultimate  causes,  origins,  reasons,  or 
essences,  of  those  phenomena.  As  Pasteur  and  other  equally  illustrious 
scientists  have  proclaimed,  experimental  science  is  essentially  positive,  i.e.  con- 
fined to  the  proximate  phenomenal  conditions  and  causes  of  things  ;  it  has 
nothing  to  say,  nor  has  it  any  need  or  any  right  to  say  anything,  about  the 
ultimate  nature,  or  first  origin,  or  final  destiny,  of  the  things  and  events  of  the 
universe. 

Yet  such  questions  arise,  and  clamour  insistently  for  solution.  How  is  it, 
or  why  is  it,  that  natural  phenomena  are  uniformly  linked  to  certain  other 
phenomenal  antecedents  or  "  physical  "  causes  ?  Is  it  absolutely  impossible, 
inconceivable,  that  this  sequence  should  be  found  not  to  obtain  in  even  a 
single  individual  instance  ?  Why  should  there  be  such  uniform  "  sequences  " 
or  "  laws  "  at  all  ?  Are  there  exceptions,  or  can  there  be  exceptions  to 
these  "  laws  of  physical  nature  "  ?  What  is  the  character  and  what  are  the 
grounds  of  the  necessity  of  these  laws  ?  Every  living  organism  comes  from 
a  living  cell — not  from  any  living  cell,  but  from  some  particular  kind  of  living 
cell.  But  why  are  there  such  kinds  of  cells  ?  Why  are  there  living  cells  at 
all  ?  Whence  their  first  origin  ?  Again,  granted  that  there  are  different  kinds  or 
types  of  living  cells,  why  should  a  particular  kind  of  cell  give  rise,  by  divi- 
sion and  evolution,  to  an  organism  of  the  same  kind  or  type  as  the  parent 
organisms  ?  Why  does  it  not  always  do  so  ?  Why  are  what  biologists  de- 
scribe as  "  monsters  "  in  the  organic  kingdom  possible  ?  And  why,  since 
they  are  possible,  are  they  not  as  numerous  as  what  are  recognized  as  the 
normal  types  or  kinds  of  living  organisms  ? 

Now  these  are  questions  in  regard  to  which  not  only  every  professing 
physical  scientist  and  every  professing  metaphysician,  but  every  thinking  man, 
must  take  up  some  attitude  or  other.  A  refusal  to  consider  them,  on  the  plea 
that  they  are  insoluble,  is  just  as  definite  an  attitude  as  any  other ;  nor  by 
assuming  this  attitude  does  any  man,  even  though  he  be  a  specialist  in  some 
department  of  the  positive  or  physical  sciences,  escape  being  a  "  meta- 
physician" or  a  "philosopher,"  however  much  he  may  deprecate  such  titles  ; 
for  he  is  taking  up  a  reasoned  attitude — we  presume  it  is  such,  and  not  the 
outcome  of  mere  prejudice — on  ultimate  questions.  And  this  is  philosophy  ; 
this  is  metaphysics.  When,  therefore,  a  physical  scientist :either  avows  or  in- 
sinuates that  because  the  methods  of  physical  science,  which  are  suitable  for 
the  discovery  of  the  proximate  causes  of  phenomena,  can  tell  him  nothing 
about  ultimate  questions  concerning  these  phenomena,  therefore  there  is  noth- 
ing to  be  known  about  these  questions,  he  is  not  only  committing  himself,  nolens 
nolens,  to  definite  philosophical  views,  but  he  is  doing  a  serious  disservice  to 
physical  science  itself  by  misconceiving  and  mis-stating  its  rightful  scope  and 
limits.  He  has  just  an  equal  right  with  any  other  man  to  utilize  the  estab- 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  421 

plished  truths  of  physical  science  to  help  him  in  answering  ultimate  questions. 
Nay,  he  may  even  use  the  unverified  hypotheses  and  systematic  conceptions  l 
of  physical  science  for  what  they  are  worth  in  helping  him  to  determine  his 
general  world-view.  But  his  competence  as  a  specialist  in  physical  science 
does  not  confer  upon  him  any  special  qualification  for  estimating  the  value  of 
these  truths  and  hypotheses  as  evidence  in  the  domain  of  ultimate  problems. 
Nor  can  he,  because  he  is  a  scientist,  or  even  because  he  may  go  so  far  as  to 
assert  the  right  of  speaking  in  the  name  of  "  science,"  claim  for  his  particular 
interpretation  the  privilege  of  exemption  from  criticism  ;  and  this  is  true  no 
matter  what  his  interpretation  may  be — whether  it  be  agnosticism,  mechan- 
ism, teleologism,  monism,  or  theism.  These  observations  may  appear  ele- 
mentary and  obvious  ;  but  the  insinuation  of  positivism  and  phenomenism,  that 
whatever  is  not  itself  phenomenal  and  verifiable  by  the  experimental  methods 
of  the  physical  sciences  is  in  no  wise  knowable,  and  the  insinuation  of 
mechanists  that  their  world-view  is  the  only  one  compatible  with  the  truths 
of  science  and  therefore  the  only  "  scientific  "  philosophy,  justify  us  in  reiter- 
ating and  emphasizing  even  such  obvious  methological  considerations.  Bear- 
ing them  in  mind,  let  us  now  examine  the  uniformity  and  necessity  of  the  laws 
of  physical  nature. 

Understanding  by  natural  law  the  natural  inclination  or 
tendency  of  the  creature  to  a  definite  line  of  activity,  this  law  is 
of  itself  determining  or  necessitating.  Moreover,  it  is  absolutely 
inseparable  from  the  essence  of  the  creature.  Granted  that  the 
creature  exists,  it  has  this  tendency  to  exert  and  direct  all  its 
forces  and  energies  in  a  definite,  normal  way,  for  the  realization 
of  its  end.  This  nisus  naturae  is  never  absent ;  it  is  observable 
even  where,  as  in  the  generation  of  "  monsters  "  by  living  organ- 
isms, it  partially  fails  to  attain  its  end.  A  law  of  nature,  taken 
in  this  sense,  is  absolutely  necessary  to,  and  inseparable  from, 
the  created  agent ;  it  admits  of  no  exceptions  ;  no  agent  can  exist 
without  it ;  for  it  is  identical  with  the  very  being  of  the  agent. 

But  the  uniformity  of  action  resulting  from  this  natural 
tendency,  the  uniform  series  of  normal  operations  whereby  it 
realizes  its  end,  is  not  absolutely  necessary,  inviolable,  unex- 
ceptional. In  the  first  place  the  Author  of  Nature  can,  for  a 
higher  or  moral  purpose,  prevent  any  created  agency  supernatur- 
ally,  miraculously,  from  actually  exercising  its  active  powers  in 
accordance  with  its  nature  for  the  prosecution  of  its  natural  end. 
But  apart  altogether  from  this,  abstracting  from  all  special  in- 
terference of  the  First  Cause,  and  confining  our  attention  to  the 
natural  order  itself,  we  have  to  consider  that  for  any  physical 
agency  to  act  in  its  natural  or  normal  manner  certain  extrinsic 
conditions  are  always  requisite :  oxygen  and  hydrogen,  for  in- 
1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §§  226-31. 


422  ONTOLOGY 

stance,  will  combine  to  produce  water,  but  only  under  certain 
conditions  of  contact,  pressure,  temperature,  etc.  This  general 
requirement  arises  from  the  fact  already  mentioned,  that  physical 
agencies  co-exist  in  time  and  space  and  are  constantly  interacting. 
These  extrinsic  conditions  are,  of  course,  not  expressly  stated 
in  the  formulation  of  those  uniformities  and  quantitative  de- 
scriptions called  "  laws  of  nature  "  in  the  second  and  third  inter- 
pretations of  this  expression  as  explained  above.  It  is  taken  as 
understood  that  the  law  applies  only  if  and  when  and  where  all 
such  conditions  are  verified.  The  law,  therefore,  as  stated  cate- 
gorically, does  not  express  an  absolutely  necessary,  universal, 
and  unexceptional  truth.  It  may  admit  of  exceptions. 

In  the  next  place,  when  we  come  to  examine  these  exceptions 
to  uniformity,  these  failures  or  frustrations  of  the  normal  or 
natural  activities  of  physical  agencies,  we  find  it  possible  to  dis- 
tinguish roughly,  with  Aristotle,  between  two  groups  of  such 
"uniformities"  or  "laws".  There  are  firstly  those  which,  so  far 
as  our  experience  goes,  seem  to  prevail  always  (ael),  unexcep- 
tionally ;  and  secondly,  those  which  seem  to  prevail  generally \ 
for  the  most  part  (eV<  TO  TTO^V),  though  not  unexceptional ly. 
The  former  would  be  the  outcome  of  active  powers,  energies, 
forces,  de  facto  present  and  prevalent  always  and  everywhere  in 
all  physical  agencies,  and  of  such  a  character  that  the  conditions 
requisite  for  their  actual  operation  would  be  always  verified. 
Such,  for  instance,  would  be  the  force  of  gravity  in  all  ponderable 
matter ;  and  hence  the  law  of  gravitation  is  regarded  as  all- 
pervadirig,  universal,  unexceptional.  But  there  are  other  natural 
or  normal  effects  which  are  the  outcome  of  powers,  forces, 
energies,  not  all-pervading,  but  restricted  to  special  groups  of 
agencies,  dependent  for  their  actual  production  on  the  presence  of 
a  great  and  complex  variety  of  extrinsic  conditions,  and  liable 
therefore  to  be  impeded  by  the  interfering  action  of  numerous 
other  natural  agencies.  Such,  for  instance,  would  be  the 
natural  powers  and  processes  whereby  living  organisms  propagate 
their  kind.  The  law,  therefore,  which  states  it  to  be  a  uniformity 
of  nature  that  living  organisms  reproduce  offspring  similar  to 
themselves  in  kind,  is  a  general  law,  admitting  exceptions. 

Operations  and  effects  which  follow  from  the  nature  of  their 
causes  are  called  natural  (K.O.&  dvro,  teal  fj.r)  Kara  crv/jL(3€/3?]K6s),1 
Some  causes  produce  their  natural  effects  always  (ra  e'f  avdytcrj? 

1  ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.,  iv.,  ch.  v. 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  423 

Kal  ael  yvyvopeva),  others  produce  their  natural  effects  usually,  as 
a  general  rule  (ra  &>?  em  TTO\V  <yiyv6/j,€va).1  Operations  and 
effects  which  are  produced  by  the  interfering  influence  of 
extrinsic  agencies  (TO  fiiaiov  "violent,"  as  opposed  to  natural),  and 
not  in  accordance  with  the  nature  of  their  principal  cause,  are 
called  by  Aristotle  accidental  (ra  Kara  crv/u/3efi7)/c6$,  ret  ev^e-^ofieva 
yiyveo-Oai) ;  and  these,  he  remarks,  people  commonly  describe  as 
due  to  chance  (real  ravra  rrdvres  <f>aalv  elvai  airo  rir^r;?).2 

All  are  familiar  with  events  or  happenings  described  as 
"fortuitous,"  "accidental,"  "exceptional,"  "unexpected,"  with 
things  happening  by  "chance,"  by  (good  or  bad)  "luck"  or 
"  fortune  ".3  There  are  terms  in  all  languages  expressive  of  this 
experience — casus,  sors,  fortuna,  rv^r],  etc.  The  notion  under- 
lying all  of  them  is  that  of  something  occurring  unintentionally, 
praeter  intentionem  agentis.  Whether  chance  effects  result  from 
the  action  of  intelligent  agents  or  from  the  operation  of  physical 
causes  they  are  not  "  intended," — by  the  deliberate  purpose  of 
the  intelligent  agent  in  the  one  case,  or  by  the  natural  tendency, 
the  intentio  naturae,  of  the  mere  physical  agency  in  the  other. 
Such  an  effect,  therefore,  has  not  a  natural  cause ;  hence  it  is 
considered  exceptional,  and  is  always  more  or  less  unexpected. 
Nature,  as  Aristotle  rightly  observes,4  never  produces  a  chance 
effect.  His  meaning  is,  that  whenever  such  an  effect  occurs  it  is 
not  brought  about  in  accordance  with  the  natural  tendency  of 
any  physical  agency.  It  results  from  a  collision  or  coincidence 
of  two  or  more  such  agencies,  each  acting  according  to  its 
nature.  The  hunter's  act  of  firing  at  a  wild  fowl  is  an  intentional 
act.  The  boy's  act  of  coming  into  the  thicket  to  gather  wild 
flowers  is  an  intentional  act.  The  accidental  shooting  of  the 
boy  is  the  result  of  a  coincidence  of  the  two  intentional  acts. 
Similarly,  each  of  all  the  various  agencies  which  bring  about  the 
development  of  an  embryo  in  the  maternal  womb  has  its  own 
immediate  and  particular  natural  effect,  and  only  mediately 
contributes  to  the  general  effect  of  bringing  the  embryo  to 
maturity.  As  a  rule  these  particular  effects  are  favourable  to  the 
general  effect.  But  sometimes  the  immediate  ends  do  not 
subserve  this  ulterior  purpose.  The  result  is  accidental,  ex- 
ceptional, a  deviation  from  the  normal  type,  an  anomaly,  a 
"  monster  "  in  the  domain  of  living  organisms. 

1  Physic.,  ii.,  ch.  v.  2  ibid.  3  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §§  264,  268-9. 

4  OuSej/  yap  us  eVuxe  voiet  rf  <pvffis. — De  Coelo,  ii.,  8. 


424  ONTOLOGY 

Aristotle's  analysis,  correct  so  far,  is  incomplete.  It  assigns 
no  ultimate  explanation  of  the  fact  that  there  are  such  encounters 
of  individual  natural  tendencies  in  the  universe,  such  failures  in 
the  subordination  of  particular  ends  to  wider  ulterior  ends. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  these  chance  effects,  although  not  "  intended  " 
by  the  natures  of  individual  created  agencies,  are  not  wholly  and 
entirely  unintended.  They  are  not  wholly  aimless.  They  enter 
into  the  general  plan  and  scheme  of  things  as  known  and  willed 
by  the  Author  of  Nature.  They  are  known  to  His  Intelligence, 
and  willed  and  ruled  by  His  Providence.  For  Him  there  can  be 
no  such  thing  as  chance.  Effects  that  are  accidental  in  relation 
to  created  causes,  effects  that  .run  counter  to  the  nature  or 
intentio  naturae  of  these,  are  foreseen  and  willed  by  Him  and 
made  to  subserve  that  wider  and  more  general  end  which  is  the 
universal  order  of  the  world  that  He  has  actually  willed  to 
create.  It  is  only  in  relation  to  the  natures  of  individual 
agencies,  and  to  the  limited  horizon  of  our  finite  intelligences, 
that  such  phenomena  can  present  the  aspect  of  fortuitous  or 
chance  occurrences. 

Before  passing  on  to  deal,  in  our  concluding  section,  with  the 
great  fact  of  order,  let  us  briefly  compare  with  the  foregoing  ex- 
planation of  nature  and  its  laws  the  attempt  of  mechanists 
to  explain  these  without  recognizing  in  the  physical  universe  any 
influence  of  final  causes,  or  any  indication  of  a  purposive  intelli- 
gence. We  have  ventured  to  describe  their  attitude  as  philosophic 
fatalism.1  According  to  their  view  there  is  no  ground  for  the  dis- 
tinction between  phenomena  that  happen  "  naturally  "  and  pheno- 
mena that  happen  "accidentally"  or  "  by  chance".  All  alike 
happen  by  the  same  kind  of  general  necessity :  the  generation  of 
a  "monster"  is  as  "natural"  as  the  generation  of  normal  off- 
spring ;  the  former,  when  it  occurs,  is  just  as  inevitably  the  out- 
come of  the  physical  forces  at  work  in  the  particular  case  as  the 
latter  is  the  outcome  of  the  particular  set  of  efficient  causes  which 
do  actually  produce  the  normal  result :  the  only  difference  is  that 

1  Fatalism  is  the  view  that  all  things  happen  by  a  blind,  inevitable,  eternally 
foredoomed  and  unintelligible  necessity.  Thus  SENECA  (Nat.  Quaest.,  L.  III.,  cap. 
36)  describes/a£wm  as  necessitas  omnium  return  actionumque,  quam  nnlla  vis  rumpat. 
This  necessitas  incluctabilis  is  totally  different  f.om  the  conditional  physical  necessity 
of  the  course  of  Nature  dependently  on  the  Fiat  of  a  Supreme  Free  Will  guided  by 
Supreme  Intelligence  (C/.  Science  of  Logic,  §§  224,  249,  253,  257).  If  the  necessity 
of  actual  occurrences  is  not  ultimately  traceable  to  the  Fiat  of  an  Intelligent  Will — 
and  mechanists  deny  that  it  can  be  so  traced — it  is  rightly  described  as  fatalistic, 
blind,  purposeless,  unintelligible. 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  425 

the  former,  occurring  less  frequently  and  as  the  result  of  a  rarer 
and  less  known  conjunction  of  "physical"  causes  than  the  latter, 
is  not  expected  by  us  to  occur,  and  is  consequently  regarded, 
when  it  does  occur,  as  exceptional.  Now  it  is  quite  true  that 
what  we  call  "  chance "  effects,  or  "exceptional"  effects,  result 
just  as  inevitably  from  the  set  of  forces  operative  in  their  case,  as 
normal  effects  result  from  the  forces  operative  in  theirs.  But  this 
leaves  for  explanation  something  which  the  mechanist  cannot 
explain.  He  regards  a  physical  law  merely  as  a  generalization, 
beyond  experience,  of  some  experienced  uniformity  ;  and  he  holds 
that  all  our  physical  laws  are  provisional  in  the  sense  that  a  wider 
and  deeper  knowledge  of  the  actual  conditions  of  interaction 
among  the  physical  forces  of  the  universe  would  enable  us  to  elim- 
inate exceptions — which  are  all  apparent,  not  real — by  restating 
our  laws  in  such  a  comprehensive  way  as  to  include  all  such  cases. 
We  may,  indeed,  admit  that  our  physical  laws  are  open  to  re- 
vision and  restatement  in  this  sense,  and  are  de  facto  often  modi- 
fied in  this  sense  by  the  progress  of  science.  But  the  important 
point  is  this,  that  the  mechanist  does  not  admit  the  existence,  in 
physical  agencies,  of  any  law  in  the  sense  of  a  natural  inclination 
towards  an  end,  or  in  any  sense  in  which  it  would  imply  intelli- 
gence, design,  or  purpose.  On  the  contrary,  claiming  as  he  does 
that  all  physical  phenomena  are  reducible  to  mechanical  motions  of 
inert  masses,  atoms ;  or  particles  of  matter  in  space,  he  is  obliged  to 
regard  all  physical  agencies  as  being,  so  far  as  their  nature  is  con- 
cerned, wholly  indifferent  to  any  particular  form  of  activity.1  Com- 
mitted to  the  indefensible  view  that  all  qualitative  change  is  reduc- 
ible to  quantitative  (i  i),  and  all  material  differences  to  differences 
in  the  location  of  material  particles  and  in  the  velocity  and  direc- 
tion of  the  spatial  motion  impressed  upon  each  by  others  extrinsic 
to  itself,  he  has  left  himself  no  factors  wherewith  to  explain  the 
actual  order  and  course  of  the  universe,  other  than  the  purely  in- 
different  factors  of  essentially  or  naturally  homogeneous  particles  of 
inert  matter  endowed  with  local  motion.  We  emphasize  this  feature 
of  indifference  ;  for  the  conception  of  an  inert  particle  of  matter  sub- 
ject to  mechanical  motion  impressed  upon  it  from  without,  is  the 
very  type  of  an  indifferent  agency.  What  such  an  entity  will  do, 
whether  or  not  it  will  move,  with  what  velocity  and  in  what  direc- 
tion it  will  move — in  a  word,  its  entire  conduct,  its  role  in  the  uni- 
verse, the  sum-total  of  its  functions — nothing  of  all  this  is  depend- 

1C/.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §§  259,  260. 


426  ONTOLOGY 

ent  on  itself;  everything  depends  on  agencies  extrinsic  to  it,  and 
on  its  extrinsic  time-and-space  relations  to  these  agencies ;  and 
these  latter  in  turn  are  in  the  same  condition  as  itself.  Now  is  it 
conceivable  that  agencies  of  this  kind,  of  themselves  absolutely  in- 
different to  any  particular  kind  of  effect,  suitable  or  unsuitable, 
regular  or  irregular,  orderly  or  disorderly,  could  actually  produce 
and  maintain  the  existing  order  of  the  universe?  If  they  were 
themselves  produced  by  an  All-Wise  and  All-Powerful  Being,  and 
definitely  arranged  in  spatial  relations  to  one  another,  and  initial 
mechanical  motion  in  definite  directions  and  velocities  impressed  on 
the  different  parts  of  the  system,  there  is  no  denying  that  Infinite 
Wisdom  and  Power  could,  by  Divine  concurrence  even  with  such 
indifferent  agencies,  realize  and  maintain  a  cosmos,  or  orderly  uni- 
verse. Such  purely  extrinsic  finality  (106)  could,  absolutely 
speaking,  account  for  the  existence  of  order,  uniformity,  regularity, 
system  ;  though  all  the  evidence  furnished  by  the  universe  of  our 
actual  experience  points  to  the  existence  of  intrinsic  finality  also  as 
understood  by  Aristotle  and  the  scholastics.  But  the  mechanist 
will  not  allow  even  extrinsic  finality ;  he  will  not  recognize  in 
the  actual  universe  of  our  experience  any  evidence  of  a  Ruling  In- 
telligence realizing  a  plan  or  design  for  an  intelligent  purpose ; 
he  denies  the  necessity  of  the  inference  from  the  data  of  human 
experience  to  the  existence  of  a  Guiding  Intelligence.  And  what 
are  his  alternatives?  He  may  choose  one  or  other  of  two. 

He  may  restate  in  the  more  scientific  and  imposing  termin- 
ology of  modern  mechanics  the  crude  conception  of  the  ancient 
Greek  atomists :  that  the  actual  order  of  the  universe  is  the 
absolutely  inevitable  and  fatal  outcome  of  a  certain  collocation  of 
the  moving  masses  of  the  physical  universe,  a  collocation  favourable 
to  order,  a  collocation  which  just  happened  to  occur  by  some  happy 
chance  from  the  essentially  aimless,  purposeless,  indifferent  and 
chaotic  motions  of  those  material  masses  and  particles.  We  say 
"  chaotic,"  for  chaos  is  the  absence  of  cosmos  ;  and  order  is  the  fact 
that  has  got  to  be  explained.  In  the  concept  of  indifferent,  inert 
atoms  of  matter  moving  through  space  there  is  emphatically  no 
principle  of  order  ; 1  and  hence  the  mechanist  who  will  not  admit  the 
necessity  of  inferring  an  Intelligence  to  give  these  moving  masses 
or  atoms  the  collocation  favourable  to  order 'is  forced  to  "explain  " 

1  "  Expliquer  par  une  rencontre  fortuite,  la  convergence  d'elements,  dont  chacun 
a  sa  pouss£e  propre,  c'est  rendre  raison  de  la  convergence  par  des  principes  de  diver- 
gence. ...  II  est  done  contradictoire  d'attribuer  au  hasard  la  raison  explicative  de 
1'ordre." — MERCIER,  op.  cit.t  §  260. 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  427 

this  supposed  collocation  by  attributing  it  to  pure  chance — the 
concur sus  for tuitus  atomorum  of  the  ancient  Greeks.  When,  how- 
ever, we  reflect  that  the  more  numerous  these  atoms  and  the 
more  varied  and  complex  their  motions,  the  smaller  is  the  chance 
of  a  collocation  favourable  to  order  ;  that  the  atoms  and  motions 
are  supposed  actually  to  surpass  any  assignable  number;  that 
therefore  the  chance  of  any  such  favourable  collocation  occurring 
is  indefinitely  smaller  than  any  measurable  proportion, — we  can 
draw  our  own  conclusions  about  the  value  of  such  a  speculation 
as  a  rational  "  explanation "  of  the  existing  cosmos.  And  this 
apart  altogether  from  the  consideration  that  the  fact  to  be  ex- 
plained is  not  merely  the  momentary  occurrence  of  an  orderly 
collocation,  but  the  maintenance  of  an  orderly  system  of  cosmic 
phenomena  throughout  the  lapse  of  all  time.  No  orderly  finite 
system  of  mechanical  motions  arranged  by  human  skill  can  pre- 
serve its  orderly  motions  indefinitely  without  intelligent  human 
supervision :  the  neglected  machine  will  get  out  of  order,  run 
down,  wear  out,  if  left  to  itself;  and  we  are  asked  to  believe  that 
the  whole  universe  is  one  vast  machine  which  not  only  goes  on 
without  intelligent  supervision,  but  which  actually  made  itself  by 
chance ! * 

Naturally  such  an  "  explanation "  of  the  universe  does  not 
commend  itself  to  any  man  of  serious  thought,  whatever  his 
difficulties  may  be  against  the  argument  from  the  fact  of  order 
in  the  universe  to  the  existence  of  an  Intelligent  Designer.  Add 
to  this  the  consideration  that  the  mechanist  theory  does  not 
even  claim  to  account  for  the  first  origin  of  the  universe  :  it 
postulates  the  existence  of  matter  in  motion.  In  regard  to  this 
supreme  problem  of  \^Q  first  origin  of  the  universe  the  attitude 
of  the  mechanist  is  avowedly  agnostic ;  and  in  view  of  what  we 
have  just  remarked  about  the  "chance"  theory  as  an  "explana- 
tion "  of  the  existing  order  of  the  universe,  it  is  no  matter  for 
surprise  that  most  mechanists  reject  this  theory  and  embrace 
the  agnostic  attitude  in  regard  to  this  latter  problem  also. 
Whether  the  agnostic  attitude  they  assume  be  negative  or  positive, 
i.e.  whether  they  are  content  to  say  that  they  themselves  at  least 
fail  to  find  any  satisfactory  rational  explanation  of  the  origin  and 
nature  of  the  cosmos,  or  contend  further  that  no  rational  solution 
of  these  problems  is  within  the  reach  of  the  human  mind,  their 

1  Cf.  Science  of  Logic,  ii.,  §§  224,  250,  and  passim. 


428  ONTOLOGY 

teaching  is  refuted  in  Natural  Theology,  where  the  theistic  solu- 
tion of  these  problems  is  set  forth  and  vindicated. 

no.  THE  ORDER  OF  THE  UNIVERSE;  A  FACT  AND  ITS 
IMPLICATIONS. — The  considerations  so  far  submitted  in  this 
chapter,  as  pointing  to  the  existence  and  influence  of  final  causes 
in  the  universe,  will  be  strengthened  and  completed  by  a  brief 
analysis  of  order  and  its  implications. 

We  have  seen  already  (55)  that  the  apprehension  of  order 
in  things  implies  the  recognition  of  some  unifying  principle  in 
what  is  manifold.  What,  in  general,  is  the  nature  of  this 
principle?  It  is  the  point  of  view,  the  standpoint  from  which  the 
unifying  arrangement  or  disposition  of  the  manifold  is  carried 
out ;  in  other  words  it  is  the  end,  object,  or  purpose,  of  the  orderly 
arrangement.  The  arrangement,  and  the  order  resulting  from 
it,  will  vary  according  to  the  end  in  view — whether,  for  instance, 
it  be  an  arrangement  of  books  in  a  library,  of  pictures  in  a 
gallery,  of  materials  in  an  edifice,  of  parts  in  a  machine.  Hence 
St.  Thomas's  definition  of  order  as  the  due  adaptation  of  means  to 
ends  :  recta  ratio  rerum  ad finem.  When  this  adaptation  is  the 
work  of  human  intelligence  the  order  realized  is  artificial,  when 
it  is  the  work  of  nature  the  order  realized  is  natural.  Art  is  an 
extrinsic  principle  of  order,  nature  implies  indeed  also  an  in- 
telligent extrinsic  principle  of  order,  but  is  itself  an  intrinsic 
principle  of  order  :  the  works  of  nature  and  those  of  art  have  this 
feature  in  common,  that  they  manifest  adaptation  of  means  to 
ends.1 

The  subordination  of  means  to  ends  realizes  an  order  which 
has  for  its  unifying  principle  the  influence  of  an  end,  a  final 
cause.  The  group  of  dynamic  relations  thus  revealed  constitutes 
what  is  called  teleological  order,  the  order  of  purpose  or  finality. 
The  realization  or  execution  of  such  an  order  implies  the  simul- 
taneous existence  of  co-ordinated  parts  or  members  in  a  system,  a 
realized  whole  with  complex,  co-ordinated,  orderly  parts,  the 
principle  of  unity  in  this  system  being  the  form  of  the  whole. 
This  realized,  disposed,  or  constituted  order,  is  called  the  esthetic 

]  "  Similiter  ex  prioribus  pervenitur  ad  posteriora  in  arte  et  in  natura  :  unde  si 
artificialia,  ut  domus,  fierent  a  natura,  hoc  ordine  fierent,  quo  mine  fiunt  per  artem  : 
scilicet  prius  institueretur  fundamentum,  et  postea  erigerentur  parietes,  et  ultimo 
supponeretur  tectum.  .  .  .  Et  similiter  si  ea  quae  fiunt  a  natura  fierent  ab  arte,  hoc 
modo  fierent  sicut  apta  nata  sunt  fieri  a  natura ;  ut  patet  in  sanitate,  quam  contigit 
fieri,  et  ab  arte  et  a  natura.  .  .  .  Unde  manifestum  est  quod  in  natura  est  alterum 
propter  alterum,  scilicet  priora  propter  posteriora,  sicut  et  in  arte." — ST.  THOMAS, 
In  II.  Phys.,  lect.  13.— C/.  supra,  p.  417,  n.  3. 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  429 

order  (55),  the  order  of  co-ordination,  composition,  constitution. 
In  ultimate  analysis,  however,  these  two  orders,  the  teleological  and 
the  esthetic,  having  as  respective  unifying  principles  the  final 
cause  and  the  formal  cause,  are  not  two  really  distinct  orders, 
but  rather  two  aspects  of  one  and  the  same  order  :  we  have 
seen  that  in  the  things  of  nature  the  intrinsic  end  or  final  cause 
of  each  is  identical  with  its  forma  substantialis  or  formal  cause 
(108).  But  the  final  cause  is  naturally  prior  to  the  formal  cause, 
and  consequently  the  teleological  order  is  more  fundamental 
than  the  esthetic. 

St.  Augustine's  definition  of  order  as  "  the  arrangement  of 
a  multiplicity  of  things,  similar  and  dissimilar,  according  its 
proper  place  to  each,"  x  reveals  the  material  cause  of  order  in 
the  multiplicity  of  varied  elements,  the  forma!  cause  of  order  in 
the  group  of  relations  resulting  from  the  arrangement  or  dispositio, 
and  the  efficient  cause  of  order  in  the  agent  that  disposes  or 
arranges  them.  The  final  cause,  though  not  directly  mentioned, 
is  implied  in  the  fact  that  the  place  of  each  factor  in  the  system 
is  necessarily  determined  by  the  function  it  has  to  fulfil,  the 
part  it  is  suited  by  its  nature  to  play,  in  contributing  to  the 
realization  of  the  end  or  purpose  of  the  arrangement. 

If,  then,  order  is  the  right  arrangement  or  disposition  of  things 
according  to  their  destination,  or  in  the  mutual  relations  demanded 
by  their  ends,  it  necessarily  follows  that  the  very  existence  of 
natural  order  in  the  universe  implies  that  this  universe  is  not  a 
work  of  chance  but  a  purposive  work,  just  as  the  existence  of 
artificial  order  in  products  of  human  art  implies  that  these 
products  are  not  the  result  of  chance  but  of  activity  influenced  by 
final  causes.2 

It  is  in  fact  impossible  to  conceive  order  except  as  resulting 
from  the  influence  of  final  causes.  Right  reason  rejects  as  an 
utterly  inadequate  explanation  of  the  natural  order  of  the  universe 
the  fantastic  and  far-fetched  supposition  of  a  chance  collocation 
of  indifferent,  undetermined  and  aimless  physical  agencies.8  If 
we  find  in  the  actual  physical  universe  difficulties  against  the  view 
that  this  universe  reveals  the  influence  of  final  causes,  such  diffi- 

1  "  Ordo  est  parium  dispariumque  rerum  sua  cuique  loca  tribuens  dispositio." — 
De  Civ.  Dei,  xix.,  13. 

2C/.  MERCIER,  op.  cit.,  §§  257-61. 

3  "  La  convergence  de  causes  indifferentes  qui  realisent  d'une  manure  harmonieuse 
ei  persistante  u>i  meme  objet  ordonnc',  tie  s'explique point  par  des  coincidences  fortuites  ; 
elle  reclame  un principe  interne  de  convergence" — Ibid.,  §  260. 


430  ONTOLOGY 

culties  do  not  arise  from  the  fact  that  there  is  order  in  the  universe, 
but  rather  from  the  fact  that  with  this  order  there  seems  to  co- 
exist some  degree  of  disorder  also.  In  so  far  forth  as  there  is 
natural  order  there  is  cogent  evidence  of  the  influence  of  final 
causes.  And  so  necessary  is  this  inference  that  even  one  single 
authentic  instance  of  natural  order  in  an  otherwise  chaotic  universe 
would  oblige  us  to  infer  the  existence  and  influence  of  a  final 
cause  to  account  for  that  solitary  instance.  We  mean  by  an 
authentic  instance  one  which  evidences  a  real  and  sustained  uni- 
formity, regularity,  mutual  co-ordination  and  subordination  of 
factors  in  the  behaviour  of  any  group  of  natural  agencies  ;  for  we 
allow  that  transient  momentary  collocations  and  concurrences  of 
indifferent  agencies,  acting  aimlessly  and  without  purpose  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  might  present  to  our  minds,  accustomed  to  seek 
for  orderly  and  purposive  phenomena,  the  deceptive  appearance 
of  order. 

Order,  then,  we  take  it,  necessarily  implies  the  existence  and 
influence  of  final  causes.  This  in  turn,  as  we  have  already  observed, 
implies  with  equal  necessity  the  existence  of  Intelligent  Purpose. 
If,  then,  there  is  natural  order  in  the  universe,  there  must  exist  an 
Intelligent  Will  to  account  for  this  natural  order. 

Leaving  the  development  of  this  line  of  argument  to  its  proper 
place  in  Natural  Theology,  there  remains  the  simple  question  of 
fact  :  Is  the  physical  universe  a  cosmos  ?  Does  it  reveal  order— 
a  natural  order  distinct  from  the  artificial  order  realized  by  the 
human  mind  in  the  mechanical  and  fine  arts,  an  order,  therefore, 
realized  not  by  the  human  mind  but  by  some  other  mind,  by  the 
Divine  Mind?  The  evidences  of  such  order  superabound.  We 
have  already  referred  to  some  of  them  (106),  nor  is  there  any  need 
to  labour  the  matter.  Two  points,  however,  in  connexion  with  this 
universally  recognized  fact  of  order  in  the  universe,  call  for  a 
brief  mention  before  we  conclude.  They  are  in  the  nature  of 
difficulties  against  the  ordinary,  reasonable  view  of  the  matter,  the 
view  on  which  the  theistic  argument  from  order  is  based. 

In  accordance  with  the  Kantian  theory  of  knowledge  it  is 
objected  that  the  order  which  we  apprehend,  or  think  we  appre- 
hend, in  the  universe,  is  not  really  in  the  universe  of  our  experience, 
but  is  as  it  were  projected  into  this  universe  by  our  own  minds  in 
the  very  process  of  cognition  itself.  It  is  therefore  not  real  but 
only  apparent,  not  noumenal  but  only  phenomenal.  It  is  simply 
a  product  of  the  categorizing,  unifying,  systematizing  activity  of 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  431 

our  minds.  It  is  a  feature  of  the  phenomenon  or  mental  product, 
i.e.  of  the  noumenal  datum  as  invested  with  a  category  of  thought. 
But  whether  or  not  it  is  a  characteristic  of  the  real  universe  itself 
man's  speculative  reason  is  by  its  very  constitution  essentially 
incapable  of  ever  discovering.  The  theory  of  knowledge  on 
which  this  difficulty  is  based  can  be  shown  to  be  unsound  and 
erroneous.  For  a  criticism  of  the  theory  we  must  refer  the 
reader  to  scholastic  works  on  Epistemology.  It  may  be  observed, 
however,  apart  from  the  merits  or  demerits  of  the  theory,  that 
the  experienced  fact  of  order  is  by  no  means  demolished  or 
explained  away  by  any  questions  that  may  be  raised  about  the 
exact  location  of  the  fact,  if  we  may  so  express  it.  Order  is  a  fact, 
an  undeniable,  experienced  fact  ;  and  it  looms  just  as  large,  and 
cries  out  just  as  insistently  for  explanation,  with  whichever  of 
the  imposing  adjectives  "noumenal"  or  "phenomenal"  a 
philosopher  may  choose  to  qualify  it ;  nor  do  we  diminish  its 
reality  by  calling  it  phenomenal  one  whit  more  than  we  increase 
that  reality  by  calling  it  noumenal. 

The  other  difficulty  arises  from  the  existence  of  disorder  in 
the  universe.  Pessimists  of  the  type  of  Schopenhauer  or 
Nietzsche  concentrate  their  attention  so  exclusively  on  the 
evidences  of  disorder,  the  failures  of  adaptation  of  means  to  ends, 
the  defects  and  excesses,  the  prodigality  and  penury,  the  pain 
and  suffering,  which  abound  in  physical  nature — not  to  speak  of 
moral  evil, — that  they  become  blind  to  all  evidences  of  order,  and 
proclaim  all  belief  in  order  an  illusion. 

The  picture  of 

Nature,  red  in  tooth  and  claw 
With  ravine  J 

is,  however,  the  product  of  a  morbid  and  distraught  imagination 
rather  than  a  sane  view  of  the  facts.  The  undeniable  ex- 
istence of  disorder,  of  physical  evils,  defects,  failures,  frustra- 
tions of  natural  tendency  in  the  universe,  does  not  obscure  or 
conceal  from  the  normal,  unbiassed  mind  the  equally  undeniable 
evidences  of  a  great  and  wide  and  generally  prevailing  order. 
Nor  does  it  conceal  from  such  a  mind  the  fact  that  the  existence 
of  order  in  any  measure  or  degree  implies  of  necessity  the  exist- 
ence of  plan  or  design,  and  therefore  of  intelligent  purpose  also. 
Inferring  from  this  fact  of  order  the  existence  of  a  Supreme 
Intelligence,  and  inferring  by  other  lines  of  reasoning  from  the 

1  TENNYSON,  In  Memoriam,  Ivi. 


432  ONTOLOGY 

data  of  experience  the  dependence  of  the  universe  on  this  Intelli- 
gence as  Creator,  Conserver  and  Ruler,  the  theist  is  confronted 
with  the  reality  of  moral  and  physical  evil  (52),  i.e.  of  disorder  in  the 
universe.  But  he  does  not  see  in  this  disorder  anything  essentially 
incompatible  with  his  established  conclusion  that  the  universe 
is  a  finite  creation  of  Infinite  Wisdom,  and  a  free  manifestation 
of  the  latter  to  man.  If  the  actual  universe  is  imperfect,  he  knows 
that  God  created  it  freely  and  might  have  created  a  more  perfect 
or  a  less  perfect  one.  Knowing  that  God  is  All-Powerful  as  He 
is  All-Wise,  he  knows  that  the  actual  universe,  though  imperfect 
absolutely,  is  perfect  relatively,  in  that  it  infallibly  reveals  the 
Divine  Wisdom  and  Goodness  exactly  in  the  measure  in  which 
God  has  willed  to  reveal  Himself  in  His  works.  Conscious  on 
the  one  hand  that  his  finite  mind  cannot  trace  in  detail  all  the 
purposes  of  God  in  nature,  or  assign  to  all  individual  events  their 
divinely  appointed  ends,  he  is  confident  on  the  other  hand  that 
the  whole  universe  is  intelligible  only  as  the  working  out  of  a 
Divine  plan,  and  not  otherwise.  To  his  mind  as  a  theist  these 
lines  are  a  clearer  expression  of  rationally  grounded  optimism 
than  they  were  perhaps  even  to  the  poet  who  penned  them  :— 

I  trust  in  nature  for  the  stable  laws 
Of  beauty  and  utility.     Spring  shall  plant 
And  Autumn  garner  to  the  end  of  time. 
I  trust  in  God — the  right  shall  be  the  right 
And  other  than  the  wrong,  while  He  endures  ; 
I  trust  in  my  own  soul,  that  can  perceive 
The  outward  and  the  inward,  Nature's  good 
And  God's.1 

We  have  seen  that  the  agencies  which  constitute  the  universal 
order  have  each  its  own  inner  principle  of  finality ;  that  these 
agencies  are  not  isolated  but  mutually  related  in  such  ways 
that  the  ends  of  each  subserve  an  extrinsic  and  remoter  end  which 
is  none  other  than  this  universal  order  whereby  we  recognize  the 
world  as  a  cosmos.  The  maintenance  of  this  order  is  the  intrinsic 
end  of  the  universe  as  a  whole :  an  end  which  is  immanent  in 
the  universe,  an  end  which  is  of  course  a  good.  But  this  universal 
order  itself  is  for  an  end,  an  extrinsic,  transcendent  end,  distinct 
from  itself;  and  this  end,  too,  must  be  a  good.  "The  universe," 
says  St.  Thomas,2  "  has  the  good  of  order  and  another  distinct 

1  BROWNING,  A  Soul's  Tragedy,  Act.  i. 

2"Universum  habet  bonum  ordinis  et  bonum  separatum." — In  Metaph.,  xii., 


FINAL  CAUSES;  UNIVERSAL  ORDER  433 

good."  The  universal  order,  says  Aristotle,  has  itself  an  end,  a 
good,  which  is  one,  and  to  which  all  else  is  ordained :  "  TT/OO?  ev 
aTravra  crvvreraKTai, ".  l  What  can  this  Supreme  Good  be, 
this  absolutely  Ultimate  End,  this  Transcendent  Principle  of 
all  nature,  and  of  all  nature's  tendencies  and  activities?  Whence 
comes  this  universal  tendency  of  all  nature,  if  not  from  the  Being 
who  is  the  One,  Eternal,  Immutable  Prime  Mover,2  and  whose 
moving  influence  is  Love  ? 3  Such  is  the  profound  thought  of 
Aristotle,  a  thought  re-echoed  so  sublimely  by  the  immortal  poet 
of  Christian  philosophy  in  the  closing  line  of  the  Paradiso  : — 

L'amor  che  muove  il  Sole  e  1'altre  stelle. 

The  immediate  factors  of  the  universal  order  of  nature,  'them- 
selves devoid  of  intelligence,  must  therefore  be  the  work  of 
Intelligent  Will.  To  arrange  these  factors  as  parts  of  one  har- 
monious whole,  as  members  of  one  orderly  system,  Supreme 
Wisdom  must  have  conceived  the  plan  and  chosen  the  means  to 
realize  it.  The  manifestation  of  God's  glory  by  the  realization 
of  this  plan,  such  is  the  ultimate  transcendent  end  of  the  whole 
created  universe.  "  The  whole  order  of  the  universe,"  writes  St. 
Thomas,  developing  the  thought  of  Aristotle,4  "  is  for  the  Prime 
Mover  thereof;  this  order  has  for  its  purpose  the  working  out  in 
an  orderly  universe  of  the  plan  conceived  and  willed  by  the  Prime 
Mover.  And  hence  the  Prime  Mover  is  the  principle  of  this 
universal  order." 

The  truths  so  briefly  outlined  in  this  closing  chapter  on  the 
order  and  purpose  of  the  universe  have  nowhere  found  more  apt 
and  lucid  philosophical  formulation  than  in  the  monumental 
writings  of  the  Angel  of  the  Christian  Schools ;  nor  perhaps 
have  they  ever  elsewhere  appeared  in  a  more  felicitous  setting  of 
poetic  imagery  than  in  these  stanzas  from  the  immortal  epic  of 
the  Poet  of  the  Christian  Schools  : — 

1  ARISTOTLE,  Metaph.,  xi.,  10.  Does  Aristotle  teach  that  God  moves  the  universe 
only  as  its  Final  Cause,  as  the  Supreme  Good  towards  which  it  tends,  or  also  as 
Efficient  Cause  ?  His  thought  is  here  obscure,  and  has  given  rise  to  much  controversy 
among  his  interpreters. 

3  'H  a.px!n  K«l  T£»  irpatTov  TWV  ovruv  a.Kivr}rov  KOI  natf  OUT?)  ital  Kara  <ri»/i/3e/3?jKOs,  KIVOVV 
8e  TT)v  TrpwTTjf  afoiov  Kol  fj.iav  nivri<nv. — Ibid.,  xi.,  8. 

Kipe?  8e  (ou  eVeKa)  a>s  Ip&invov,  Kivov^fvov  Se  raAAa  Kti/et. — ibid.,  J. 

4"  Totus  ordo  universi  est  propter  primum  moventem,  ut  scilicet  explicetur  in 
universe  ordinato  id  quod  est  in  intellectu  et  voluntate  primi  moventis.  Et  sic 
oportet  quod  a  prirno  movente  sit  tota.  ordinatio  universi." — Ibid.,  xii.,  1.  12. 


434 


ONTOLOGY 

.  .  .  Le  cose  tutte  quante 
Harm5  ordine  tra  lora  ;  e  questa  £  forma 
Che  1'universo  a  Dio  fa  simigliante. 

Qui  veggion  Palte  creature  1'orma 
DelPeterno  Valore,  il  quale  e  fine 
Al  quale  e  fatta  la  toccata  norm  a. 

NelP  ordine  ch'io  dico  sono  accline 

Tutte  nature  per  diverse  sorti 

Piu  al  Principio  loro  e  men  vicine  ; 

Onde  si  muovono  a  diversi  porti 

Per  lo  gran  mar  dell'essere,  e  ciascuna 

Con  instinto  a  lei  dato  che  la  porti. 

Questi  ne  porta  il  fuoco  inver  la  Luna  : 
Questi  ne'  cuor  mortali  e  permotore  ; 
Questi  la  terra  in  se  stringe  ed  aduna. 

Ne  pur  le  creature,  che  son  fuore 
D'intelligenza,  quest'  arco  saetta 
Ma  quelle  ch'  hanno  intelletto  ed  amore. 

La  Providenza,    che  cotanto  assetta, 

Del  suo  lume  fa  il  ciel  sempre  quieto, 

Nel  qual  si  volge  quel  ch'ha  maggior  fretta  : 

Ed  ora  li,  com'  a  sito  decreto, 

Cen  porta  la  virtu  di  quella  corda, 

Che  cio  che  scocca  drizzo  in  segno  lieto.1 

1      ....     Among  themselves  all  things 

Have  order  ;  and  from  hence  the  form,  which  makes 

The  universe  resemble  God.     In  this 

The  higher  creatures  see  the  printed  steps 

Of  that  eternal  worth,  which  is  the  end 

Whither  the  line  is  drawn.     All  natures  lean 

In  this  their  order,  diversely,  some  more, 

Some  less  approaching  to  their  primal  source. 

Thus  they  to  different  havens  are  moved  on 

Through  the  vast  sea  of  being,  and  i  each  one 

With  instinct  giv'n,  that  bears  it  in  its  course ; 

This  to  the  lunar  sphere  directs  the  fire, 

This  prompts  the  hearts  of  mortal  animals, 

This  the  brute  earth  together  knits  and  binds. 

Nor  only  creatures,  void  of  intellect, 

Are  aim'd  at  by  this  bow  ;  but  even  those 

That  have  intelligence  and  love,  are  pierced. 

That  Providence,  who  so  well  orders  all, 

With  her  own  light  makes  ever  calm  the  heaven, 

In  which  the  substance  that  hath  greatest  speed 

Is  turned  :  and  thither  now,  as  to  our  seat 

Predestin'd,  we  are  carried  by  the  force 

Of  that  strong  cord,  that  never  looses  dart, 

But  at  fair  aim  and  glad  .  .  . 

— DANTE,  Paradiso,  Cant.  i.  (tr.  by  CARY). 


INDEX. 


Absolute,  the,  47  sq. ;  and  relative,  332 

sqq. 
Accidents,    individuation    of,   133    sqq. ; 

causes  of,  235-6  ;  divisions  of,  237  sqq. ; 

existence   and    relation    to   substance, 

232  sqq.,  240  sqq.,  243,  247  ».,  249,  313. 
Actio  et  passio,  v.  causality,  causes. 
Actio  intentionalis ,  378. 
Actio  in  distans,  395-6. 
Action,  immanent  and  transitive,  73,  369, 

391-2. 


AUGUSTINE,  ST.,  on  basis  of  possible 
essences,  8g  n.,  94  ;  on  evil,  185  n. ;  on 
beauty,  198,  200  ».,  202  w. ;  on  time, 
322  ;  on  order,  429. 

AUREOLUS,  no  n. 

AVERROISM,  284. 


BALMES,  89  «.,  90  «.,  93. 

BANEZ,  D.,  108  n.,  350  n. 

BAUMGARTEN,  192  n. 

Beatitudo,  175  n.,  411. 

Actual  and  potential,  52  sqq.  and  passim.    Beauty,  the   Beautiful,  13,  14  ;    analysis 
Actuality,  goodness  and  perfection,  173        of,  192  sqq. ;  definitions  of,  201  sqq. 
sqq.  j  Being,  concept  analysed,   32  sqq. ;    real 


being   and  logical  being,  10,  42  sqq., 
85,  140. 
—  and  Ideal  Being,  45  sqq.,  85. 


Actus  Purus,  54,  58. 

AEGIDIUS,  108  n. 

Aeveternitas,  aevum,  230. 

Agnosticism,  96,  97,  335,  383,  409,  414,  I  —  fundamental  distinction  in,  46  sqq. 

427.  —  metaphysical  grades  of,  123  sqq. 

ALBERTUS  MAGNUS,  108  n.,  201  «.,  288. 
ALEXANDER  OF  HALES,  no  n.,  112  n. 
Analogy,  analogical  predication,  36  sqq., 

122  n.,  212,  240,  272,  330  ;  a.  inference, 

386-7,  391. 

ANDRONICUS  OF  RHODES,  17. 
Anima  mundi,  284. 
ANSELM,  ST.,  353  n. 
Anthropology,  19. 


Appetite,  167  sqq. 

Appetitus  naturalis,  409-10,  413-15. 

ARISTOTLE,  on  philosophy,  5 ;  on  es- 
theiics,  13  ;  on  theology,  15,  16  ;  on 
special  sciences,  16 ;  on  analogy,  40 ; 
on  change,  51,  56,  68  sqq.  ;  on  essence, 
75  ;  on  individual,  120-1 ;  on  the  good, 
167  sqq. ;  on  beauty,  200  n.,  201  n. ; 
on  substance  and  accident,  209,  249  ; 
on  "  first  "  and  "  second  "  substances, 
252-3 ;  on  quality,  287,  290-2  ;  on 
habits,  293-6;  on  quantity,  311  «.  ; 
on  place,  318  ;  on  time,  342  ;  on  re- 
lation, 337  «.,  346-8 ;  on  principles, 
358  n. ;  on  causes,  361  sqq.,  367  ;  on 
final  causes,  406  sqq. ;  on  "  nature," 
416  sqq. ,  422-4,  426;  on  order  of  the 
universe,  433. 

Art,  and  nature,  416-17. 

Arts,  fine  and  mechanical,  13,  14,  430 ; 
and  science,  194-5  '•>  scope  of,  204  sqq. ; 
and  morals,  205-6. 

Atomism,  v.  Mechanism. 


435 


—  potential  and  actual,  51  sqq. 

BERGSON,  30,  289  n.,  303. 

BERKELEY,  215,  221,  350  n.,  400. 

BIEL,  G.,  no  ». 

BILLOT,  266  n. 

Bilocation,  322. 

BOETIUS,  329. 

BOIRAC,  343. 

BONA VENTURE,  ST.,  on  distinction  of  soul 

and  faculties,  247-8. 
BOSSUET,  196,  360. 
BROWNING,  432. 
BRUNETIBRE,  196. 
BULLIAT,  130  n. 

CAJETAN,  24,  38  n.,  108  n.,  350  n. 

CAPREOLUS,  87  «.,  108  n.,  350  n. 

GARY,  434  n. 

Categories,  ultimate,  analysis  of,  208 
sqq. ;  not  adequately  distinct  as  modes, 
210-n,  350;  but  exhaustive,  211-12. 

Causa  exemplaris,  362. 

Causalitas  " intentionalis"  413. 

Causality,  causes,  notion  analysed,  357 
sqq.;  classification,  361  sqq.;  prin- 
ciple of  C.,  369  sqq.,  384-5  ;  "  plurality  " 
of  causes,  380 ;  causality  and  uni- 
formity, 377,  381,  382;  "physical" 
cause,  382,  419 ;  phenomenist  view  of, 
382  sqq.  ;  and  inductive  science,  359, 
379,  381,  382  n. ;  and  determinism,  377  ; 
and  creation,  391,  400-1. 

28* 


436 


ONTOLOGY 


Causality,  efficient,  as  index  of  real  dis- 
tinction, 148  ;  classification  of  efficient 
causes,  372  sqq.  ;  instrumental,  373-6  ; 
objective  validity  of  concept,  -$$2.  sqq.  ; 
origin  of  concept,  385  sqq.  ;  analysis  of, 
366  sqq.,  388  sqq.  ;  erroneous  theories 
of,  392-6;  and  occasionalism,  396  sqq., 
400  sqq. 

—  final  (v.  purpose),  361,  368;  intrinsic! 
and  extrinsic    finality,  404   sqq.,   426; 
all-pervading   influence   of,  409  ;    divi-  j 
sions   of,   409   sqq.;    analysis   of,    411 
sqq.;    as   implying   intelligence,   409, 
414-15,  426. 

—  formal,  361,  364-5. 

—  material,  361,  364-6. 
Chance,  423  sqq. 

Change,  61  sqq.,  302-5;  and  time,  323  ; 

and  causality,  367,  389-96. 
CICERO,  i. 
CLARKE,  135. 
Cognitio  "  vulgar  is"  2. 
Composition,  logical   and   metaphysical, 

34  ;  essential  and  integral,  311,  314-16  ; 

as  index  of  finiteness,  248. 
COMTE,  30,  334. 
Conceptualism,  24,  125. 
Concursus  Divinns,  66,  329,  348,  375  «., 

388  sqq.  ;  necessity  of,  389-91,  401-3. 
Condition,  and  cause,  358-9,  419. 
Consciousness,  and  personality,  373,  277  | 

sqq.  ;  "  subliminal,"  282  sqq. 
Constitutive   or   constructive    factors   in 

thought,  45,  74,  340,  355-6. 
Contingent  and  necessary  Being,  47. 
Co-operation,  in  philosophical  studies,  30. 
Correlatives,  388. 
Corruptio  et  generatio,  71,  186. 
Cosmology,  16,  19,  285,  309,  364,  388,  393. 
COUSIN,  301,  387. 
Creatio  ab  aeterno,  89,  328. 
Criteriology,  v.  Knowledge,  theory  of. 

DANTE,  434  n. 

DAVID  OF  DINANT,  125  n. 


DE  SAN,  241  ».,  327  n.,  331  «. 
DESCARTES,  on  basis  of  essences,  96,  97  ;  [ 

on  substance,  214,  226-8,  230,  241  n.  ;  j 

on  accidents,  244  ;    on  corporeal  sub-  j 

stance,  312-13,  315,  397- 
Design,  v.  purpose  and  final  cause. 
DE  WULF,  6  n.,  27  «.,  29  ».,  156  n 

n.,  284 

Disposition,  v.  habit. 
Dispositiones  adformam,  295  n. 
Disorder,  fact  of,  431-2. 
Distinctions,  doctrine  of,    105  sqq. 

sqq.,  242-3,  249-51,  301-5- 

DOMET  DE  VORGES,  387  ». 

"  Double  law  "  in  man,  176. 
"  Double  personality,"  282-4. 
DRISCOLL,  89  ». 


195 


139 


DUPASQUIER,  99  n. 
DURANDUS,  non. 
Duration,  322,  325  n.,  328  sqq. 

Education,  and  habits,  298. 

Efficiency,  concept  of,  v.  cause  (efficient). 

Ego,  v.  person. 

ELEATICS,  51,  125,  303. 

End  (v.  purpose),  406. 

Energies,  equivalence  of,  395. 

Ens  a  se,  ab  alio,  47  ;  and  ens  in  se,  230-1, 

334- 

Ens  rattonis,  v.  Being. 

Entitative  habit,  292  n. 

Epistemology,  v.  Knowledge,  theory  of. 

Essc  "  intentionale"  45,  46,  412. 

Essence,  analysis  of,  75  sqq. ;  and  nature 
and  substance,  79,  258. 

Esthetics,  13,  14,  192  sqq. 

Eternity,  328  sqq. ;  of  essences,  80  sqq. 

Ether,  hypothesis  of,  317,  395. 

Ethics,  11-12,  296-7,  428-9. 

Eucharist,  and  substance  and  accidents, 
223  11.,  233,  243  n.  :  and  quantity,  312- 
16  ;  319  11.,  322,  345  n. 

EUCKEN,  28. 

Evil,  analysis  of,  182  sqq. 

Exemplarism,  98,  100,  161-2. 

Existence,  and  essence,  101-13  ;  of  acci- 
dents, 243-61  ;  and  subsistence,  266, 
269  ;  arid  action,  301. 

Extension,  v.  quantity. 

Extrinsic  denominations,  238,  239. 

Faculties,  298  sqq. ;  and  substance,  300  sqq. 

Faith  and  reason,  5. 

Fatalism,  424  n. 

Figure,  or  form,  as  indicative  of  nature, 

292-3. 

Finis,  finality,  v.  purpose  and  final  causes. 
Finite  and  Infinite,  47,  301-3. 
FONSECA,  113  n. 

"  Forma  "  as  essence  or  nature,  78-9,  130. 
Formae  subsistentes,  129. 
"  Formal  "  unity,  156. 
Formalitates,  154. 
Formative  principles,  simplicity  of,  317- 

18  ;  plurality  in  the  individual,  365  (n.  4). 
FRANCIS  OF  VITTORIA,  113  n. 
FRANZELIN,  now.,  267  n. 
Free  causes,   376-7 ;  and  occasionalism, 

398. 
Freedom  of  thought,  6. 

Generatio,  v.  corruptio. 

Genuensis,  98  n. 

"  Genus"  and  "differentia"  as  "materia" 

and  "forma,"  79  n.,  365  (n.  4). 
GEULINCX,  397. 
GIOBERTI,  94. 
Good,  analysis  of  the,  167  sqq. ;  divisions 

of  the,  175  sqq.;  and  being,  177  sqq.; 

and  beauty,  193. 


INDEX 


437 


GOUDIN,   IDS  M. 

Graceful,  elegant,  the,  199  n. 
GREGORY  OF  VALENTIA,  no  n. 

Habit,  analysis  of,  292  sqq. 

Haecceitas,  125,  132. 

HARPER,  99  n. 

HEGEL,  Hegelianism,  30,  33,46,  49,  67  8, 

97,  208,  335. 

HENRY  OF  GHENT,  87  n.,  113  n. 
HERACLITUS,  51,  303. 
HICKEY,  89  w. 
HOBBES,  334. 

HOFFDING,  230  n. 

HUME,  213  ;  on  substance,  215,  217,  221 ; 
on  cause,  370  «.,  385. 

HUNLEY,  219  W. 

Hypostasis,  265. 
Hypostatic  Union,  267-71. 

Idealism,  214,  334-6,  341,  343,  400. 
Identity,  135  sqq. ;  and  change,  139,  226, 

241,  278  ;  personal,  276,  277  sqq. 
Immaterial,  positively  and  negatively,  16. 
Immensity,  Divine,  319. 
Impenetrability,  309,  322. 
Incommutabilia  vera,  89  n. 
Indiscernibles,  identity  of,  135. 
Individuation,  120,  123  sqq.,  148,  *6i. 
Infinite  and  Finite,  47;    and  categories, 

212. 

Infinite  regress  in  causation,  373. 
Inherence,  v.  accident. 
Intentio  mentis,  10,  43,  144  «.,  145,  211, 

339- 

"  Intentio  naturae,"  414  n.,  416,  423. 
"  Intentional  "  causality,  413. 

JAMES,  30;  on  personal  identity,  283-4. 
JOHN  OF  ST.  THOMAS,  108  n.,  350  n. 
JOSEPH,  on  meanings  of  "  cause,"  379- 

80. 
JOUFFROY,  275. 

KANT,  21,  30,  -121,  145,  201,  208,   228, 

334,  335,  343,  385,  393,  394.  43°. 

KAPPES,  M.,  75  w. 

KLEUTGEN,  38,  39,  40,  43,  87  n.,  103  »., 
142  n. ;  on  accidents,  242,  247  ;/..,  267 
n.,  330  n. 

KLIMKE,  67  n. 

Knowledge,  relativity  of,  335  sqq. 

—  scientific,  2. 

—  theory  of,  n,  20,  23,  45,  46,  70,  108  ; 
and  doctrine  of  distinctions,  143-6, 
151-3;  and  categories  of  being,  207 
sqq.,  285,  289 ;  and  category  of  rela- 
tion, 332  sqq.,  385 ;  and  causality, 
393  ;  and  order,  430-1. 

Lacensis,  Philosophia,  21. 
LACORDAIRE,  89  n. 
LADD,  24,  27. 


LAHOUSSE,  99  w. 

LAMINNE,  60  n.,  371  n. 

Law,  of  nature,  418  sqq. 

LEIBNIZ,  21,  98  «.,  135,  182,  227,  298, 

387,  406. 
LEO  XIII,  7,  26. 

LlBERATORE,  99  n. 
LlTTRE,  213. 

LOCKE,    on    substance,    214,    221  ;     on 

personality,  277-84,  334. 
Logic,  10. 

MAKER,  223  n.,  23011.,  273  n. ;  on  con- 
sciousness of  self,  274-6,  282  n. ;  on 
theories  of  self,  283-4,  289  ». ;  on  per- 
ception of  time,  324  «.,  326-7 ;  on 
relativity  of  knowledge,  336  ». ;  on 
cause,  386  n. 

MALEBRANCHE,  397-400. 

Mamcheism,  182,  189-91. 

MASTRIUS,  99  n. 

Materia  prima,  Aristotle  on,  71-2. 

Materia  signata,  127,  129,  131,  135. 

Mathematical  unity,  116,  119. 

Mathematics,  philosophy  of,  17,  25. 

Matter,  and  evil,  190. 

—  divisibility  ot  (v.  individuation), 
317;  continuity  of,  317-18. 

Measurement,  relativity  of,  325-7. 

Mechanism,  mechanical  conception  of 
universe,  69,  265,  289,  393-6,  404,  409, 
413,  414,  424-9. 

Memory,  and  personality,  276-84. 

MENDIVE,  99  n. 

MERCIER,  on  division  of  metaphysics,  21 ; 
on  scholasticism,  26-7 ;  on  character- 
istics of  essences,  83,  93-4  ;  on  analogi- 
cal concept  of  God,  97  ;  on  distinction, 
107  ;  on  phenomenism,  213,  224  n., 
269  w. ;  on  faculty  and  substance,  305 
w.;  on  interaction,  391;  on  efficient 
cause,  393  n. ;  on  occasionalism,  398 
«.;  on  mechanism,  426  «.,  429  w. 

Metaphor,  and  analogy,  39. 

Metaphysics,  division  of,  15  sqq. ;  etymo- 
logy of,  17,  18 ;  scope  of,  24,  25,  27 ; 
and  physics,  v.  physics. 

MILL,  213,  220,  334,  343;  on  causes, 
382. 

Modal  distinction,  150,  245  sqq. 

Modes,  accidental  and  substantial,  150-1, 
239,  245  sqq.,  270,  325  «.,  330-1. 

MOLINA,  113  n. 

Monadology,  of  Leibniz,  227. 

Monism,  46,  97,  103,  125,  230,  284,  350 
n.,  399,  409. 

Monophysites,  268. 

Monopsychism,  284. 

Moral  cause,  377-8. 

Morality  and  art,  205-6. 

Motion  (v.  change),  and  efficient  causality, 
392-6. 

Multitude,  actually  infinite,  321-2. 


ONTOLOGY 


Nature    and    substance,    257   sqq. ;    and 

person,  261  sqq. ;  analysis  of  notion  of, 

461 sqq. 

Necessary  and  Contingent  Being,  47. 
Necessity  of  essences,  81  sqq. 
—  of  physical  laws,  419-28. 
NEWMAN,  on  scope  of  philosophy,  22, 31 ; 

on  causality,  377,  387. 
NIETZSCHE,  431. 
Nisus  naturae,  421. 
Nominalism,  125. 
Notae  individuantes ,  124,  131. 
NYS,  309  «.,  311 n.,  321  «.,  327  «.,  328  «., 

395  n. 


Occasion,  and  cause,  359. 

Occasionalism,  226,  387,  388;  examined, 
396-403. 

Ontology,  21,  23. 

Ontologism,  95,  350  n. 

Optimism,  181-2,  432. 

Order,  static  and  dynamic,  199,  428 ; 
and  beauty,  194,  199,  428 ;  natural  and 
artificial,  428 ;  and  relation,  342  ;  and 
final  cause,  428  ;  and  formal  cause,  429  ; 
and  intelligent  purpose,  417,  429-30, 
433- 


Panpsychism,  250. 

Pantheism,  v.  monism. 

PAULSEN,  213,  226-7. 

Perfection,  analysis  of,  171  sqq. ;  and 
beauty,  201 ;  grades  of,  59,  172-3  ;  in 
substances,  134,  255 ;  and  distinction, 
142  n. ;  and  habit,  297 ;  and  relation, 

342. 

Person,  personality,  262  sqq. ;  definition 
of,  265,  270  n.  ;  distinction  from  indi- 
vidual nature,  266  sqq. ;  false  theories 
of,  276  sqq. ;  "  subconscious,"  283-4. 

PESCH,  99  n. 

Pessimism,  181-2,  431. 

Phenomenism,  and  substance,  213  sqq., 
223 ;  substantializes  accidents,  215  ; 
substantializes  consciousness,  281,  282- 
4  ;  and  causality,  382  sqq.,  398,  421. 

Philosophy,  notion  of,  2  sqq.  ;  divisions 
of,  7  sqq. ;  and  special  sciences,  28-9. 

Physics,  14,  17 ;  v.  cosmology ;  and 
metaphysics,  394-6,  419-21. 

Place,  analysis  of,  318  sqq. 

PLATO,  93,  94,  95,  167,  200  n.,  201. 

Pleasure,  sensible  and  esthetic,  196-7, 
205-6. 

POINCARE,  199  H. 

Positivism,  214,  334,  383,  409,  421. 

Possible,  the,  52  sqq.,  82  sqq.;  and  intel- 
ligible, 97 ;  and  passive  potentiality, 
109. 

Potentia  obediantialis,  372. 

Potential,  v.  actual. 


Power,  operative,  55  ;  and  passive  poten- 
tiality, 298  sqq.  ;  as  index  of  perfection, 
202  n. ;  classification  of,  305. 

Praescisio  objecti-va  et  formalis,  34,  146-7. 

Prime  mover,  necessity  of,  65-7. 

Principle,  notion  of,  357-8. 

Privatio,  62,  358. 

Providence,  and  chance,  424. 

Psychology,  19,  296. 

Purpose,  and  the  good,  169,  405  sqq, ; 
and  perfection,  408 ;  and  order,  429. 

PYTHAGORAS,  i. 

QUALITY,  analysis  of,  286  sqq. ;  divisions 
of,  288  sqq. ;  characteristics  of,  305  sqq.; 
grades  of  intensity  in,  307. 

Quantity,  andindividuation,  133  ;  analysis 
of,  309  sqq. ;  and  corporeal  substance, 
311  sqq. ;  internal  and  external,  309-10, 
314- 

Rate,  notion  of,  325  n.,  327  n. 
RADA,  99  n. 

Realism,  moderate,  23,  125,  133,  242-3, 
320. 

—  extreme,  46,  156-7. 
Reason,  and  cause,  359-60. 

—  "  sufficient,"  135,  182,  360. 
REINSTADLER,  106  n. 

Relation,  analysis  of,  336  sqq. ;  logical, 
338  sqq. ;  real,  341  sqq. ;  transcenden- 
tal, 345 ;  predicamental,  346  sqq. ; 
reality  of  the  "  esse  ad,n  350-6. 

Relative,  the,  47  sqq.,  332  sqq. 

RENOUVIER,  335. 

Revelation,  4  sqq.,  12,  25,  189,  233,  247, 
252,  263,  265,  267,  312-15,  328,  358  n. 

RICKABY,  276  n. 

ROSCOE,  83  H. 

ROYCE,  25. 

SCHIFFINI,  99  n. 

Scholasticism,   26,    30 ;     on    substance, 

218  sqq. 

SCHOPENHAUER,  431. 
Science,  v.  knowledge. 
Sciences,    special,    16,    27;    at    Louvain 

and  Maynooth,  29  n. 
SCOTUS,  34,  39  sqq.,  99,  113,  125,  132, 

153  sqq.,  247,  267  n. 
Self,     consciousness    of,    274     sqq.    (v. 

person.) 
SENECA,  424  n. 

Sensibilia  propria  et  communia,  objec- 
tivity of,  70 ;  per  se  et  per  accidens, 

218,  260. 

Sensism,  334,  383  n.,  394  n. 
Similarity,  and  identity,  137,  306  ;    and 

distinction,  153 

Simplicity,  and  quantity,  307  n. 
Situs,  category  of,  309,  319  n. 
SOCRATES,  167. 
Solipsism,  86. 


INDEX 


439 


SONCINAS,  108  n. 

SOTO,  D.  DE,  113  n. 

Space,  analysis  of,    319  sqq. ;    problems 

on,  321-2. 
Specialists,   scientific,   and   metaphysics, 

27-28. 

Species  expressa,  46;  sensibilis,  313. 
SPENCER,  30,  213,  228,  229,  335. 
SPINOZA,  on  substance,  230-2,  334,  399. 
Spirits,  individuation  of,  129,  131. 
STORCHENAU,  98  ». 
SUAREZ,  41,  44,  no  M.,  in  ».,  267  n. 
Sublime,  the,  199  n. 
Subsistentia,    131,    261  sqq.    (v.  person), 

271-3- 

Substance,    category!  of,    undeniable  in 
thought,  209,   215,   220,    281,   282-4  > 
reality  of,  213  sqq. ;  cognoscibility  oi 
213  sqq.,  219  sqq. ;  plurality  of,  221 
distinction  from   accidents,    224   sqq. 
301-5  ;  erroneous  notions  of,  225  sqq. 
permanence  of,  229,  277  ;  divisions  of, 
252   sqq. ;    complete   and  incomplete, 
254  sqq. ;  corporeal  and  spiritual,  253-4, 
315-6  ;  relation  to  space,  319. 

Substantial  change,  71. 

SULLY-PRUDHOMMR,  203  w. 

Supernatural  theology,  5,  12,  13. 

—  end,  411. 

Suppositum,  suppositalitas,  v.  person, 
personality. 

TAINE,  213. 

Taste,  esthetic,  197. 

Teleology,  v.  purpose  and  final  cause. 

TENNYSON,  31,  431. 

Theodicy,  21. 

Theology,  natural,  15,  19,  182,  189,  285, 
334,  428,  430. 

THOMAS,  ST.,  on  division  of  philosophy, 
9,  18,  26 ;  on  analogy,  36 ;  on  ab- 
solute being,  49  ;  on  action,  60,  64 ;  on 
essences,  76,  79,  92 ;  on  existence  and 
essences,  102  ».,  no  n.,  112  n.;  on 
unity,  116  ».,  117  w.,  119  n.,  120  «., 
156  n.,  250;  on  individuation,  127  n.; 
on  ontological  truth,  162-3,  an<i  falsity, 
165  w. ;  on  the  good,  169  n.,  174  »., 
176  n.,  180  «.;  on  evil,  183  «.,  184  n. ; 
on  the  beautiful,  193  ».,  194  w.,  200  n. ; 
on  Aristotle's  categories,  210,211  n. ; 
on  substance  and  accident,  209  w., 
223  w.,  231  ».,  232  n.t  234  ».,  241  »., 
243  n.,  248  ;  on  essence  as  nature,  258- 
6 1  ;  on  subsistence  and  personality, 
263  «.,  266  «.,  269  ;  on  quality,  288, 
290,  293 ;  on  habits,  294-6 ;  on  power 
and  substance,  300  sqq. ;  on  grades  in 
quality,  307-8  ;  on  quantity  and  cor- 
poreal substance,  311  sqq. ;  on  body 


and  spirit,  314-6;  on  time,  323-4;  on 
creatio  ab  aeterno,  328  ;  on  duration, 
330  ». ;  on  relations,  339-40,  341  n., 
342  ».,  344  n.t  347,  348  «.,  35*  »-,  353 
n.,  354  «.,  355  w.,  356  w. ;  on  classifica- 
tion of  causes,  362  n. ;  on  material  and 
formal  causes,  365  n. ;  on  action,  367-8  ; 
on  instrumental  cause,  375  ;  on  created 
causes,  388  «.,  389  «. ;  on  occasionalism, 
400  «.;  on  final  causality,  408  «.,  412 
».,  415  w. ;  on  nature  and  art,  417, 
428  n. ;  on  order,  428,  432  n.,  433. 

Thought  and  imagery,  392-6. 

Time,  analysis  of,  322  sqq. ;  problems  on, 
328. 

Tradition,  31. 

Transcendental  and  generic  notions,  35  ; 
attributes  of  being,  114  sqq.;  relations, 

345- 

Transubstantiation,  233. 
Truth,  ontological,  158  sqq. 
TURNER,  21  n. 

Ubi,  category  of,  309,  319. 

Ubiquity,  Divine,  319. 

Uniformity  of  Nature,  377 ;  and  law, 
418 ;  and  inductive  science,  419  ; 
degrees  of,  422  sqq. 

Union,  substantial  and  personal,  268. 

Unity,  doctrine  of,  114  sqq.,  242-3  ;  "or- 
ganic "  and  "mechanical,"  249-51; 
260-1,  278;  of  living  individual,  280- 
i.  3<>*-5  5  conceptual,  337. 

Universal  and  individual  (v.  individua- 
tion), 252-3. 

Univocal,  v.  analogical. 

URRABURU,  35,  87  n.,  88  «.,  99  «.,  124  ». ; 
on  modes,  245  n.  ;  on  nature  and 
person,  267-8,  270  n.,  288  ».,  345  n., 
355  n. ;  on  instrumental  causes,  374  n. ; 
on  cause,  393  n. 

Vacuum,  and  motion,  321. 
VALLET,  201. 
Variety,  and  beauty,  200. 
VASQUEZ,  no  w. 
VEITCH,  334  w. 
Vital  change,  64-5. 
—  acts,  246  n. 
Voluntarism,  96-7. 

Weltanschauung,  World-view,  4,  29,  30. 
WILLIAM  OF  OCKAM,  95. 

WlNDELBAND,  7,  2O8  W. 

WOLFF,  21,  98. 

WUNDT,  213,  226,  267  ». 

ZIGLIARAV  64  n.,  107  ».,  156  n.,  301  n., 
320  n.t  398  «. 


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